Tamsin Edwards

Tamsin Edwards
Born	Tamsin L. Edwards
Education	St Margaret's School, Exeter
Alma mater	University of Manchester (BSc, PhD)
Known for	Climate science Science communication
Scientific career
Institutions	University of Bristol Open University King's College London
Thesis	Diffractively produced Z bosons in the muon decay channel in pp collisions at √s=1.96 TeV, and the measurement of the efficiency of the DØ Run II Luminosity Monitor (2006)
Doctoral advisor	Brian Cox[1]
Website	www.kcl.ac.uk/people/tamsin-edwards

Tamsin Edwards is a British climate scientist and Professor at King's College London.[2][3] She is a popular science communicator and writes for the Public Library of Science (PLOS).[4]

Early life and education

Edwards became interested in physics after reading A Brief History of Time.[5] The daughter of Michael Edwards,[6] she completed A-Levels in Physics, Chemistry and Maths at St Margaret's School, in Exeter.[7] She studied physics in the School of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Manchester. She completed a PhD in Particle Physics at the University of Manchester under the supervision of Brian Cox.[1] Her thesis investigated the production of Z bosons, detected by their subsequent decay to muons, using data collected at the Tevatron.[1]

Research and career

Edwards joined the Open University as a lecturer, working in the Palaeoenvironmental Change team.[8][9] She uses computer models to predict and study climate change,[10][11] with a particular interest in the impact on sea level rise of changes in the Antarctic ice sheet.[12] She studied how a glacier's grounding line (the point at which is separates from a continent's bedrock and floats into the sea) affects the rate of flow of glaciers, and estimated the effects of positive feedback.[13][14] In 2017 Edwards joined King's College London as a lecturer in geography.[15] She will be a lead author for Chapter 9 (Ocean, cryosphere, and sea level change) of the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.[16]

Edwards writes a popular science blog hosted by the Public Library of Science (PLOS).[4] She has written for The Guardian and contributed chapters to books about climate change.[17][18][19] Working with the Met Office, Edwards created educational resources about sea level rise for the 2017 United Nations Climate Change Conference ("COP23").[20]

In 2014 she gave a TEDx talk at CERN, How to Love Uncertainty in Climate Science.[21] After fights between climate scientists and sceptics on Twitter in 2014, Edwards was part of a dinner party discussing how they could calm the debate.[22] The dinner included David Rose and Richard A. Betts, and Edwards was the only woman.[22] In 2015 she was celebrated as one of twenty women "making waves" at the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference.[23] She won the 2016 British Science Association Charles Lyell Award for Environmental Sciences.[13][24] She discussed how computer models can be used to predict ice sheet collapse and how to communicate uncertainty.[24] In 2017 she was profiled in the HuffPost Australia's Breaking The Ice series.[25] She is a speaker at the 2018 Bluedot Festival.[26][27][28]

Edwards has acted as a scientific consultant for the BBC. She was a consultant on the BBC's Climate Change by Numbers, which won an American Association for the Advancement of Science award for Science Journalism,[29] and a 2015 award for "Best Presentation of Science in an Environment Issue" from EuroPAWS.[30] She has appeared on BBC Radio 4[31][32] and BBC World Service.[33]

She was awarded the 2020 Climate Science Communications Award by the Royal Meteorological Society.[34]

On 28 January 2021, Edwards took part in a panel event of international experts called Climate Change: Why should we care?, organised by the Science Museum Group.[35]

In July 2023, at the Bluedot Festival, Edwards announced she has become a Professor at King’s College.^[better source needed]

Selected publications

• Nick, Faezeh M.; Vieli, Andreas; Langer Andersen, Morten; Joughin, Ian; Payne, Anthony J; Edwards, Tamsin L.; Pattyn, Frank; van de Wal, Roderik (2013). "Future sea-level rise from Greenland's main outlet glaciers in a warming climate" (PDF). Nature. 497 (7448): 235–238. Bibcode:2013Natur.497..235N. doi:10.1038/nature12068. PMID 23657350. S2CID 4400824.
• Hawkins, Ed; Edwards, Tamsin; McNeall, Doug (2014). "Pause for thought" (PDF). Nature Climate Change. 4 (3): 154–156. Bibcode:2014NatCC...4..154H. doi:10.1038/nclimate2150. S2CID 85406377.
• Ritz, Catherine; Edwards, Tamsin L.; Durand, Gaël; Payne, Anthony J; Peyaud, Vincent; Hindmarsh, Richard C. A. (2015). "Potential sea-level rise from Antarctic ice-sheet instability constrained by observations" (PDF). Nature. 528 (7580): 115–118. Bibcode:2015Natur.528..115R. doi:10.1038/nature16147. PMID 26580020. S2CID 4462953.
• Edwards, Tamsin (4 December 2017). "Future of the Sea: Current and Future Impacts of Sea Level Rise on the UK". Foresight Future of the Sea project. Government Office for Science.
• Edwards, Tamsin L.; Brandon, Mark A.; Durand, Gaël; Edwards, Neil R.; Golledge, Nicholas R.; Holden, Philip B.; et al. (2019). "Revisiting Antarctic ice loss due to marine ice-cliff instability". Nature. 566 (7742): 58–64. Bibcode:2019Natur.566...58E. doi:10.1038/s41586-019-0901-4. hdl:1983/de5e9847-612f-42fb-97b0-5d7ff43d37b8. PMID 30728522. S2CID 59606547.

References

1. Edwards, Tamsin L. (2006). Diffractively produced Z bosons in the muon decay channel in pp collisions at √s=1.96 TeV, and the measurement of the efficiency of the DØ Run II Luminosity Monitor (PhD thesis). University of Manchester. doi:10.2172/892267. OCLC 930686728. Copac 36713207.
2. "King's College London - Edwards, Dr Tamsin". Kcl.ac.uk. Retrieved 23 May 2018.
3. Tamsin Edwards publications indexed by the Scopus bibliographic database. (subscription required)
4. "All Models Are Wrong". All Models Are Wrong. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
5. "The Real Deal: Tamsin Edwards, Climate Modeller". highheelsinthelab.blogspot.co.uk. 17 January 2011. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
6. "The Poetry & Science of Ice and Fire". Champernowne Trust. 3 August 2016. Retrieved 22 August 2018.
7. "About me". Retrieved 14 February 2023.
8. "Team". Palaeoenvironmental Change. 8 March 2014. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
9. The Open University STEM (7 April 2017), Past, Present and Future Climates - Dr Tamsin Edwards, retrieved 15 May 2018
10. "Tamsin Edwards - Stories of Change - OpenLearn - Open University". Open.edu. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
11. Edwards, T. L.; Challenor, P. G. (2013). "Risk and uncertainty in hydrometeorological hazards". In Rougier, Jonathan; Sparks, Steve; Hill, Lisa J. (eds.). Risk and Uncertainty Assessment for Natural Hazards. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1107006195. Retrieved 22 May 2018.
12. Edwards, Tamsin (18 November 2015). "Antarctic ice sheet collapse will cause sea levels to rise. So what's new?". The Guardian. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
13. "Place your bets: the collapse of the Antarctic ice sheet". British Science Association. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
14. "Dr Tamsin Edwards:Reconciling projections of the Antarctic contribution to sea level rise". Imperial College London. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
15. "King's College London - Edwards, Dr Tamsin". Kcl.ac.uk. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
16. "Working Group I contribution to the IPCC Sixth Assessment Report (AR6-WG1)". Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Retrieved 22 May 2018.
17. "CaSE | One climate data point". Sciencecampaign.org.uk. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
18. Edwards, T. L.; Challenor, P. G. (2013). "Hydrometeorological hazards under future climate change". In Rougier, Jonathan; Sparks, Steve; Hill, Lisa J. (eds.). Risk and Uncertainty Assessment for Natural Hazards. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1107006195. Retrieved 22 May 2018.
19. "Tamsin Edwards". The Guardian. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
20. "COP 23". Met Office. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
21. Edwards, Tamsin. "Ripples of Curiosity". tedxcern.web.cern.ch. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
22. "Climate consensus: scientists and sceptics suspend hostilities". Climate Home News. 3 October 2014. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
23. "Tamsin Edwards - Scientist making a name for herself as a fearless communicator | 1 Million Women". Retrieved 15 May 2018.
24. "Award Lecture winners announced as BSF2016 programme goes online". British Science Association. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
25. Sharwood, Anthony (20 June 2017). "Here's What Happened When A Climate Scientist Went To A Pub To Argue With Deniers". Huffington Post. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
26. "Tamsin Edwards – Bluedot Festival". Bluedot Festival. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
27. "Bluedot announces stellar line-up for 2018". Science Focus. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
28. "Celebrating Earth Day - Jodrell Bank". Jodrell Bank. 22 April 2017. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
29. "The 2015 Winners Named in Expanded AAAS Kavli Science Journalism Awards Competition". American Association for the Advancement of Science. 10 November 2015. Retrieved 22 May 2018.
30. "The 2015 Science TV and New Media Award Winners". EuroPAWS. 25 November 2015. Retrieved 22 May 2018.
31. "Climate Change, State of the World's Plants, Antibiotic Resistance, Telephone Metadata, Bat Detective, BBC Inside Science - BBC Radio 4". BBC. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
32. "The Life Scientific: Tamsin Edwards on models of climate change". BBC. Retrieved 19 May 2021.
33. "Health Advice for Gay Men When Homosexuality is Illegal, The Science Hour - BBC World Service". BBC. Retrieved 15 May 2018.
34. "Pioneering urban meteorologist is the first female recipient of the Symons Gold Medal". Royal Meteorological Society. 7 June 2021. Retrieved 7 June 2021. Awarded as an outstanding climate scientist who has been a leading and highly respected communicator of climate science for over a decade. She has set the standard internationally for pro-active, open and objective communication with the public on climate change and its scientific basis and has built a huge reputation for clarity and as a trusted voice of authority.
35. "Climate Change: Why Should We Care?". Science Museum Group. Retrieved 16 June 2021.