About Nicolas Bellouin

Nicolas works on atmospheric aerosol modelling and validation.

Areas of expertise:

• aerosol modelling;

• aerosol-radiation interactions;

• radiative forcing of the climate system.

Current activities

Nicolas is a senior scientist working on natural and human-made microscopic atmospheric aerosol particles. Nicolas develops aerosol modelling schemes within the Met Office Unified Model for interactive simulation of past, present and future aerosol distributions in climate change experiments. He also validates those simulations against ground-based and satellite observations of aerosols.

The main focus of Nicolas' work is to assess the role and importance of aerosols within the climate system. This includes estimating the strength of the interaction between aerosols and solar and terrestrial radiation through scattering and absorption, which impact the energy budget at the top of the atmosphere and the surface. For his work, Nicolas uses large-scale numerical modelling (such as HadGEM2-ES, radiative transfer modelling, and satellite aerosol retrieval products (such as MODIS).

Nicolas is involved in the UKCA project, the MACC European programme, the AeroCom project, and the Millenium experiment with FAMOUS.

Career background

Nicolas joined the CCE team in 2004. Nicolas holds a PhD in aerosol satellite remote sensing from the Université des Sciences et Technologies de Lille, France.