Research

I graduated from Durham University in 2020 with a PhD in Earth Sciences. The overall aim of this project was to develop tools that could be used after an earthquake to generate an overview of the areas worst-affected by landslides. For this, I developed and tested new methods of rapid landslide detection using synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data acquired by the Sentinel-1 and ALOS-2 satellites.
Following this, I moved to France to work for 2 years at Géosciences Environnement Toulouse (GET) as a CNES research fellow. At GET, I developed a new method of using Sentinel-1 to constrain the timings of rainfall-triggered landslides. When applied to the Nepal monsoon, this method allows us to associate landslides with particular periods of intense rainfall during a period when cloud-cover obscures optical satellite images. We have also been able to quantify the effect of a large earthquake in 2015, which led to landslides occurring earlier and in dryer conditions than in a normal year.
While at ESA, I hope to develop a combined approach to studying soil moisture and landslide activity based on Sentinel-1 amplitude and coherence. Both changes in soil moisture and landslides alter the scattering properties of the Earth’s surface, giving them a signal in Sentinel-1 images. In remote areas, like the Himalayas, this would allow us to better understand how landslide activity and soil water content evolve during the monsoon.