Professor Andrew Shepherd

Head Of School

School: Geography and Natural Sciences

I am Head of the Department of Geography and Environment at Northumbria, Director of the NERC Centre for Polar Observation and Modelling, Principal Scientific Advisor to the European Space Agency's CryoSat satellite mission, co-leader of the ESA-NASA Ice Sheet Mass Balance Inter-comparison Exercise, and a contributing author to IPCC assessment reports.

I use satellites to study Earth's climate, and my main contributions to science have involved developing remote observations of the cryosphere - especially using radar altimetry. I have led field campaigns in Europe, Africa, the Arctic, and in Antarctica to calibrate and validate satellite sensors.

I studied in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Leicester, and I have held academic posts at University College London, and the Universities of Cambridge, Edinburgh, and Leeds.

Email Andrew

Research Themes and Scholarly Interests

My research focusses on measuring changes of the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets, on understanding their interaction with the global climate system, and on establishing their contribution to global sea level rise. I also have a keen interest in the calibration and validation of satellite systems, and in the development of novel satellite sensors to tackle problems in geophysical research. To do this, I work closely with technical experts in space agencies and in the space industrial sector, with scientific collaborators in glaciology, meteorology, oceanography, and ice sheet modelling, and with government agencies.

Key Publications

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
BIOPOLE - Biogeochemical processes and ecosystem functioning in changing polar systems and their global impacts, Tarling, G., Abrahamsen, E., Aksenov, Y., Anderson, M., Arrowsmith, C., Baker, C., Barry, C., Belcher, A., Benavides, M., Bischof, M., Boland, E., Bowes, M., Brearley, J., Brown, P., Burson, A., Buzzard, S., Callaghan, N., Coët, A., Cook, K., Coombs, S., Evans, C., Fielding, S., Ford, E., Fournier, I., Freer, J., Garcia-Martin, E., Ghosh, V., Giering, S., Grant, A., Griffiths, H., Hamilton, R., Hendry, K., Hill, S., Hubot, N., Hunter, A., Johnston, N., Katavouta, A., Kitson, E., Leng, M., Lewis, I., Linse, K., Lofts, S., Manno, C., Martin, A., Marzocchi, A., Mawji, E., Mayor, D., McKenzie, R., Meijers, A., Meredith, M., Munday, D., Pereira, M., O'Brien, A., Olszewska, J., Painter, S., Palmiéri, J., Patel, S., Pickard, A., Richt, J., Rynders, S., Sanders, R., Saunders, R., Shepherd, A., Slater, T., Spears, B., Stowasser, G., Swiggs, A., Taylor, L., ten Hoopen, P., Thorpe, S., Timms-Wilson, T., van Soest, M., Venables, H., Wright, Z., Yool, A., Young, E. 3 Sep 2025, In: Research Ideas and Outcomes
Detecting sea ice leads and floes in the Northwest Passage using CryoSat-2, Swiggs, A., Lawrence, I., Ridout, A., Shepherd, A. 1 Jan 2025, In: IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing
Multi-frequency altimetry snow depth estimates over heterogeneous snow-covered Antarctic summer sea ice - Part 2: Comparing airborne estimates with near-coincident CryoSat-2 and ICESat-2 (CRYO2ICE), Fredensborg Hansen, R., Skourup, H., Rinne, E., Jutila, A., Lawrence, I., Shepherd, A., Høyland, K., Li, J., Rodriguez-Morales, F., Simonsen, S., Wilkinson, J., Veyssiere, G., Yi, D., Forsberg, R., Casal, T. 2 Oct 2025, In: The Cryosphere
A Simulation of Snow on Antarctic Sea Ice Based on Satellite Data and Climate Reanalyses, Lawrence, I., Ridout, A., Shepherd, A., Tilling, R. 1 Jan 2024, In: Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans
Greenland Ice Sheet Elevation Change From CryoSat‐2 and ICESat‐2, Ravinder, N., Shepherd, A., Otosaka, I., Slater, T., Muir, A., Gilbert, L. 28 Dec 2024, In: Geophysical Research Letters
Publisher Correction: Remotely sensing potential climate change tipping points across scales, Lenton, T., Abrams, J., Bartsch, A., Bathiany, S., Boulton, C., Buxton, J., Conversi, A., Cunliffe, A., Hebden, S., Lavergne, T., Poulter, B., Shepherd, A., Smith, T., Swingedouw, D., Winkelmann, R., Boers, N. 1 Mar 2024, In: Nature Communications
Remotely sensing potential climate change tipping points across scales, Lenton, T., Abrams, J., Bartsch, A., Bathiany, S., Boulton, C., Buxton, J., Conversi, A., Cunliffe, A., Hebden, S., Lavergne, T., Poulter, B., Shepherd, A., Smith, T., Swingedouw, D., Winkelmann, R., Boers, N. 6 Jan 2024, In: Nature Communications
The effect of landfast sea ice buttressing on ice dynamic speedup in the Larsen B embayment, Antarctica, Surawy-Stepney, T., Hogg, A., Cornford, S., Wallis, B., Davison, B., Selley, H., Slater, R., Lie, E., Jakob, L., Ridout, A., Gourmelen, N., Freer, B., Wilson, S., Shepherd, A. 4 Mar 2024, In: The Cryosphere
Heat stored in the Earth system 1960-2020: where does the energy go?, Von Schuckmann, K., Minière, A., Gues, F., Cuesta-Valero, F., Kirchengast, G., Adusumilli, S., Straneo, F., Ablain, M., Allan, R., Barker, P., Beltrami, H., Blazquez, A., Boyer, T., Cheng, L., Church, J., Desbruyeres, D., Dolman, H., Domingues, C., García-García, A., Giglio, D., Gilson, J., Gorfer, M., Haimberger, L., Hakuba, M., Hendricks, S., Hosoda, S., Johnson, G., Killick, R., King, B., Kolodziejczyk, N., Korosov, A., Krinner, G., Kuusela, M., Landerer, F., Langer, M., Lavergne, T., Lawrence, I., Li, Y., Lyman, J., Marti, F., Marzeion, B., Mayer, M., MacDougall, A., McDougall, T., Monselesan, D., Nitzbon, J., Otosaka, I., Peng, J., Purkey, S., Roemmich, D., Sato, K., Sato, K., Savita, A., Schweiger, A., Shepherd, A., Seneviratne, S., Simons, L., Slater, D., Slater, T., Steiner, A., Suga, T., Szekely, T., Thiery, W., Timmermans, M., Vanderkelen, I., Wjiffels, S., Wu, T., Zemp, M. 17 Apr 2023, In: Earth System Science Data
Insights into the vulnerability of Antarctic glaciers from the ISMIP6 ice sheet model ensemble and associated uncertainty, Seroussi, H., Verjans, V., Nowicki, S., Payne, A., Goelzer, H., Lipscomb, W., Abe-Ouchi, A., Agosta, C., Albrecht, T., Asay-Davis, X., Barthel, A., Calov, R., Cullather, R., Dumas, C., Galton-Fenzi, B., Gladstone, R., Golledge, N., Gregory, J., Greve, R., Hattermann, T., Hoffman, M., Humbert, A., Huybrechts, P., Jourdain, N., Kleiner, T., Larour, E., Leguy, G., Lowry, D., Little, C., Morlighem, M., Pattyn, F., Pelle, T., Price, S., Quiquet, A., Reese, R., Schlegel, N., Shepherd, A., Simon, E., Smith, R., Straneo, F., Sun, S., Trusel, L., Van Breedam, J., Van Katwyk, P., van de Wal, R., Winkelmann, R., Zhao, C., Zhang, T., Zwinger, T. 7 Dec 2023, In: Cryosphere

PGR Supervision

Marlena Holloway Quantifying Arctic Sea Ice Thickness though UAV and Satellite Remote Sensing Start Date: 01/10/2025
Marlena Holloway Quantifying Arctic Sea Ice Thickness though UAV and Satellite Remote Sensing Start Date: 01/10/2025 End Date: 17/10/2025
Amy Swiggs Exploring Arctic sea ice variability using satellite and meteorological records Start Date: 01/07/2023 End Date: 17/10/2025
Natasha Lee Trends in the Extent and Colour of Icelandic Proglacial Lakes Detected using Optical Satellite Remote Sensing Start Date: 28/03/2023 End Date: 17/10/2025
Amy Swiggs Exploring Arctic sea ice variability using satellite and meteorological records Start Date: 01/07/2023 End Date: 20/12/2025
Natasha Lee Trends in the Extent and Colour of Icelandic Proglacial Lakes Detected using Optical Satellite Remote Sensing Start Date: 28/03/2023