Earth Systems Science

Professor Andy Watson leads the oceans and atmospheres research group that undertake observations and modelling of atmospheric and ocean composition, physics and chemistry.

Andy's research interest is “Earth Systems Science” — the processes that keep the Earth habitable for life today and over four billion years of Earth history. He is particularly interested in the natural controls on atmospheric carbon dioxide, which is intimately connected with the climate of the planet and rapidly increasing due to human emissions. Understanding the natural system is very important, because if we don’t know how that works, we will be unable to predict how it may change in the future as we disturb it the climate.

This understanding of what maintains the strange composition of our atmosphere has implications for how common we think Earth-like planets, and life, might be around other stars.