An external view of the Met Office building at night.

Prof John Thuburn

Numerical methods and geophysical fluid dynamics are the core areas of John's research activities.

Areas of expertise

  • Numerical methods for weather and climate modelling
  • Geophysical fluid dynamics
  • Climate dynamics

Current activities

  • Using normal mode analysis and other techniques to understand and improve the representation of wave propagation in numerical models.
  • Research to understand and improve wave propagation and conservation properties for different ways of gridding the sphere.
  • Research to understand and improve the coupling of resolved processes to subgrid-scale processes in numerical models.

Career background

Since January 2005 Prof. Thuburn has held the position of Chair in Geophysical Fluid Dynamics at the University of Exeter, jointly funded by the Met Office. Before that he worked at the University of Reading. As a post-doc, he was one of three model development coordinators on UGAMP.
He became a lecturer at the University of Reading in 1998 and Reader in October 2002. His most well-known research from that time is on understanding the nature and dynamics of the tropopause. Since 2001 he has been collaborating with the Dynamics Research group at the Met Office on the development of numerical methods for their weather and climate models.

External recognition 

March 2008–present: Co-Editor, Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society