01
About
I'm a physical geographer trained at Manchester (BSc, 1992–1995) across the full width of a discipline that refuses to stay indoors: GIS, remote sensing, glaciology, hydrochemistry, soil science, and economic geography. Before completing my degree I worked as a summer student at the University of Manchester Regional Research Laboratory under Dr Robert Barr, contributing GIS analysis to municipal research projects for Manchester City Council. Simultaneously I held a position as network assistant at MIDAS — Manchester Information Datasets and Associated Services — the national data service for SPOT satellite imagery and Census data, running on a Cray CS6400 at Manchester Computing Centre. That combination of applied GIS, high-performance computing infrastructure, and field geography was an accidental education that shaped everything that followed.
My doctoral research at Swansea (1995–2000), supervised by Prof. M.J. Barnsley, sits at the intersection of satellite radiometry and biophysical modelling. I work with POLDER on ADEOS, MODIS on Terra, SPOT-4 VGT, and CHRIS/PROBA — inverting bidirectional reflectance distribution function (BRDF) models to retrieve land surface albedo, leaf area index, and fraction of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation at continental scale. Field campaigns in Norfolk and the Jornada del Muerto semidesert, New Mexico are where I go to check whether the models are telling the truth.
I care about the gap between what satellites measure and what is actually on the ground. Closing it requires both a spectrometer and a working knowledge of radiative transfer physics. I try to be useful at both ends.
02
Skills & tools
Satellite sensors
MODIS / Terra
POLDER / ADEOS
SPOT-4 VGT & HRVIR
CHRIS / PROBA
Landsat TM / ETM+
Radiometry & modelling
BRDF modelling & inversion
Biophysical parameter retrieval
Land surface albedo
LAI / FAPAR retrieval
Atmospheric correction
PROSPECT / SAIL models
Field methods
Broadband albedometry
Field spectroradiometry (ASD)
Glacier mass balance
Hydrochemical sampling
3D canopy structure (BPMS)
GPS survey
Computing
C · Fortran · IDL
Tcl/Tk · early Python
Bash · Linux · Solaris
Cray CS6400 (MIDAS)
ENVI · ERDAS Imagine
GIS & spatial
Arc/Info · Idrisi
SPOT & Census data (MIDAS)
Municipal GIS analysis
Spatial variability analysis
Digital elevation modelling
Teaching & comms
Undergraduate statistics
Environmental modelling
Conference organisation
Public science communication
LaTeX · technical writing
03
Projects
MIDAS National Data Service & Manchester Regional Research Laboratory
Manchester Computing Centre · University of Manchester RRL · Manchester City Council
Situation
In the early 1990s, national spatial datasets — SPOT satellite imagery, UK Census data — were expensive, technically demanding to access, and held on institutional infrastructure that most researchers couldn't operate independently. MIDAS (Manchester Information Datasets and Associated Services) was the national service distributing and processing this data on a Cray CS6400 at Manchester Computing Centre. The University of Manchester Regional Research Laboratory (RRL), under Dr Robert Barr, was applying GIS to live municipal problems for Manchester City Council.
Task
As a summer student at the RRL I contributed GIS analysis to active municipal research projects. As a concurrent network assistant at MIDAS I supported researcher access to national SPOT and Census datasets on the Cray — bridging field geography, applied GIS, and high-performance computing before those disciplines had learned to talk to each other.
Action
Ran Arc/Info analysis for Council research — spatial queries, boundary joins, attribute analysis, map production. At MIDAS: managed user requests for satellite and Census data extracts, processed jobs on the Cray, and provided technical support to researchers across the UK academic network.
Result
Delivered GIS outputs for live Council research. More lastingly: running real analysis on SPOT imagery at national scale on a Cray, as an undergraduate, was an education unavailable in any classroom. It established that infrastructure and data access are not separate from the science — they are the science.
Cray CS6400SPOT imageryUK Census
Arc/InfoUnixMunicipal GIS
BRDF inversion for land surface parameter retrieval — POLDER/ADEOS, MODIS, and SPOT-4 VGT
University of Wales Swansea · Norfolk · Jornada del Muerto, New Mexico · PROVE '97
Situation
MODIS on Terra, POLDER on ADEOS, and SPOT-4 VGT were newly operational sensors providing multi-angle observations of land surface reflectance at scales previously impossible. The theoretical framework for inverting this data into physically meaningful surface properties (albedo, LAI, FAPAR) existed but had not been operationalised at global scale. Ground truth validation data was sparse and poorly standardised across sites and instruments.
Task
As a doctoral researcher in Prof. M.J. Barnsley's Earth Observation group at Swansea, I was responsible for field campaign design and execution, cross-sensor validation methodology, and contribution to the algorithm development that became the operational MODIS BRDF/Albedo product (MOD43) and equivalent SPOT-4 VGT biophysical retrievals.
Action
Designed and ran field campaigns in agricultural Norfolk and the Jornada del Muerto semidesert, New Mexico (PROVE '97). Collected broadband albedo via paired pyranometers, field spectroradiometry via ASD instruments, and canopy structure via the BPMS system. Wrote C and IDL code to process field data, match it to MODIS, POLDER, and SPOT-4 VGT overpass geometry, and compare ground-derived to satellite-retrieved albedo across spatial scales. Co-developed graphical teaching tools in Tcl/Tk for optical remote sensing education at Swansea, published with Barnsley.
Result
Field data contributed to validation of the first operational MODIS BRDF and albedo science data products, published in Remote Sensing of Environment. Co-authored on SPOT-4 VGT biophysical retrievals, CHRIS/PROBA vegetation canopy potential, and multiple IGARSS conference papers. 3,906 citations accumulated — primarily because the MODIS product papers became canonical reference literature for the global remote sensing community.
MODIS / TerraPOLDER / ADEOS
SPOT-4 VGTCHRIS / PROBA
CIDLFortran
Tcl/TkENVIArc/Info
Linux · SolarisASD Spectrometer
Alpine glacier mass balance and meltwater hydrochemistry
Zermatt, Switzerland · University of Manchester Alpine Glacier Project
Situation
Alpine glaciers in the early 1990s were beginning to show measurable retreat. The Manchester Alpine Glacier Project ran summer field campaigns in the Zermatt region to track mass balance, proglacial hydrochemistry, and glacial geomorphology — one of the most intensively documented glacial environments in Europe.
Task
Awarded the HE David Travel Bursary for European research, I joined as a student field scientist responsible for ablation stake readings, meltwater hydrochemical sampling, and GIS data capture of surface features.
Action
Weekly ablation stake measurements across the glacier surface to quantify mass loss. Meltwater sampling at proglacial stream sites for major ion chemistry and suspended sediment load. Surface feature mapping via GPS, transferred to Arc/Info in Manchester for spatial analysis.
Result
Field datasets contributed to the project record. More lastingly: standing on a glacier with a tape measure while understanding the physics of what I was measuring established the instinct that models need to be checked by someone willing to go and look. That instinct ran through every subsequent field campaign in New Mexico and Norfolk.
Arc/InfoIdrisi
GPS surveyField hydrochemistryMass balance methods
Co-operative Conference on Sustainability
Manchester · Co-operative Bank sponsorship · Several hundred public attendees
Situation
In the mid-1990s, sustainability was not yet mainstream academic vocabulary. A group of Manchester geography students wanted to convene a serious public conversation — not an internal seminar, but an open, professionally run day conference for academics, practitioners, and the public.
Task
Student committee member responsible for programme development, speaker coordination, and logistics. Secured sponsorship from the Co-operative Bank, one of the few UK financial institutions with an explicit ethical lending policy.
Action
Speaker invitations and briefings, session scheduling, public-facing communications. Deliberately open to all — not restricted to students or academics.
Result
Several hundred attendees across the day. For a student-organised event with no institutional budget, that was genuine public reach. It taught me that complex systems thinking can draw a crowd if you trust the audience's intelligence and don't condescend to it.
Event productionExternal sponsorship
Programme curationPublic communications
Remote Sensing Society Annual Conference — RSS'99
Cardiff, Wales
Situation
RSS'99 was the principal UK gathering for the remote sensing research community — academics, satellite operators, government agencies, and commercial users. Hosted in Cardiff.
Task
As a PhD student in the Swansea Earth Observation group, contributed to local organisation — logistics, venue coordination, and session support. Also presented research from the MODIS and POLDER validation work.
Result
Conference ran successfully. Organising a professional conference as a PhD student rather than simply attending it is a different education — you see how a field actually works, what gets discussed in corridors that never makes it into papers.
Conference logisticsProgramme coordinationResearch presentation
04
Publications
2012Conf
Building a data governance model for learning analytics
LAK12, Society for Learning Analytics Research · April 2012
2012Seminar
Enterprise, Business, and Technical Architects Peer Group — ITANA Seminar 06F
EDUCAUSE · November 2012
2011Seminar
Building Enterprise Architecture on Campus — ITANA Seminar 02Z
EDUCAUSE · October 2011
2009Chapter
Lean Enterprise Architecture Case Study
Doing Enterprise Architecture: Enabling the Agile Institution · JISC · March 2009
2002Journal
First operational BRDF, albedo nadir reflectance products from MODIS
Remote Sensing of Environment · Elsevier · November 2002
2000Journal
On the potential of CHRIS/PROBA for estimating vegetation canopy properties from space
Remote Sensing Reviews · December 2000
2000Journal
A comparison of satellite-derived spectral albedos to ground-based broadband albedo measurements modeled to satellite spatial scale for a semidesert landscape
Remote Sensing of Environment · Elsevier · October 2000
2000Journal
Characterizing the spatial variability of broadband albedo in a semidesert environment for MODIS validation
Remote Sensing of Environment · Elsevier · October 2000
2000Journal
Teaching the principles of optical remote sensing using graphical tools developed in Tcl/Tk
Article · November 2000
2000Conf
Estimation of land-surface albedo and biophysical properties using SPOT-4 VGT and semi-empirical BRDF models
VITO / CNES · VGT2000
2000Report
Determination and validation of land surface biophysical properties using SPOT-4 Vegetation and HRVIR: Interim Report
CNES
2000Conf
The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) BRDF and albedo product: preliminary results
IGARSS 2000 · IEEE · February 2000
1999Report
MODIS BRDF/Albedo Product: Algorithm Theoretical Basis Document Version 5.0
NASA · April 1999
1999Conf
Inversion of semi-empirical, kernel-driven models using POLDER on ADEOS data
ALPS'99 · CNES · Méribel, France
1999Conf
Temporal stability of semi-empirical, kernel-driven BRDF model parameters using the POLDER-on-ADEOS data archive
Remote Sensing Society · RSS'99 · Cardiff
1998Conf
Investigations of the spatial variability of albedo during the Grassland PROVE '97 Jornada field campaign
IGARSS '98 · IEEE · August 1998
1998Conf
Validation of a manual measurement method for deriving 3D canopy structure using the BPMS
IGARSS '98 · IEEE · August 1998
1997Conf
A sensitivity analysis of a coupled leaf-canopy-growth model
IEEE
1997Conf
Development of interactive, graphical, computer-based teaching tools for remote sensing in Tcl/Tk
IEEE
1996Conf
Sensitivity analysis of a coupled leaf (PROSPECT) and canopy (SAIL) reflectance model
Remote Sensing Society · 22nd Annual Conference · September 1996
1996Journal
Making sense of sensors
GIS Europe · January 1996
05
Teaching
STAT 101
Statistics for Geographers — Tutor
First-year undergraduate statistics. Descriptive and inferential methods, hypothesis testing, regression, spatial statistics. The course that convinces geographers that numbers are not the enemy.
ENVMOD 209
Environmental Modelling for Geographers — Teaching Assistant
Second-year undergraduate environmental modelling. Hydrological and land surface process models, GIS-based spatial analysis, introduction to scientific computing. The direct ancestor of the computational geography curriculum later rebuilt as open educational material under Wayward House.
06
Awards & Service
1993
Summer Student — University of Manchester Regional Research Laboratory
GIS analysis for municipal research projects under Dr Robert Barr, in partnership with Manchester City Council.
1993
Network Assistant — MIDAS National Data Service
National SPOT satellite imagery and Census data service on the Cray CS6400 at Manchester Computing Centre. Supported researchers across the UK academic network.
1994
HE David Travel Bursary for European Research
Competitive departmental award funding participation in the Manchester University Alpine Glacier Project, Zermatt, Switzerland.
1994
Volunteer Glaciologist — Manchester University Alpine Glacier Project
Field volunteer contributing mass balance measurements, hydrochemical sampling, and geomorphological mapping. Zermatt.
1994
Student Committee Member — Co-operative Conference on Sustainability
Co-organised student-led public day conference, Manchester. Co-operative Bank sponsorship. Several hundred public attendees.
1999
Local Organiser — Remote Sensing Society Annual Conference RSS'99
Organisation and logistics for the principal UK remote sensing research conference. Cardiff.