ACES professor Örjan Gustafsson received 50 million SEK (€5 million) from the Swedish Research Council for a ten-year research project to tackle two major areas of uncertainty in climate research. The award is part of the Distinguished Professors Grant programme that aims to “create conditions for the most distinguished researchers to conduct long-term, innovative research with great potential to achieve scientific breakthroughs.”
“We hope to be able to make real progress over the next decade in two of the most critical scientific uncertainties surrounding climate change. The first one concerns the thawing permafrost and collapsing methane hydrates in the Arctic, and the second one concerns regional air pollution from incomplete combustion in China and India that sweeps across vast parts of eastern and southern Asia,” says Örjan Gustafsson.
Professor Örjan Gustafsson, ACES
His team, along with 20 collaborating researchers from Asia, the United States, and Europe, have recently begun a large 4-month field campaign that includes coordinated surveys of the brown cloud across southern Asia.
“The Distinguished Professors Grant programme will enable us to continue to conduct major field campaigns in remote but critical areas for climate. We will study the outflow of air pollution from China and India and the links between climate change and emissions of climate-affecting gases and air particles from thawing permafrost and methane hydrates in coastal regions of East Siberia,” says Örjan Gustafsson.
According to Örjan Gustafsson, this additional financial security means that his team can conduct research with a long-term perspective in mind, which will, in turn, contribute in-depth knowledge about these challenging areas in climate research.
“This is the result of many years of finely tuned teamwork and collaboration with leading researchers from Europe, the United States, Russia, India and China. The award means that the research group will continue to exist for much longer,” says Örjan Gustafsson.
