Modelling and data-intensive science methods to understand substorm-driven energy deposition into the polar atmosphere

Space Weather describes environmental conditions in space that can have an impact on Earth, and severe Space Weather is listed as one of the highest priority natural hazards in the UK Government's National Risk Register. Conditions in Earth's magnetosphere are constantly changing over the substorm cycle: a build-up and explosive release of magnetic flux and energy from the interaction between the solar wind and the planetary field. At substorm onset, much of this energy makes its way toward the polar regions, dissipating into the upper atmosphere as changes in Earth's radio emissions (intensifications and frequency changes) and changes in the brightness and morphology of auroral emissions are associated with this varying energy deposition.
This project will use i) sophisticated modelling to extract relevant energy parameters from years of data from auroral cameras operated by Southampton's Space Environment Physics group in the high Arctic, ii) develop novel computing methods to automate the process of analysing decades of spacecraft observations of radio emissions, to select the features which characterize energy deposition, iii) simulate the changing visibility of radio and auroral emissions from orbiting spacecraft, to quantify the sensitivity of the datasets to the observation location.

The proposed centre will produce 55+ PhD students highly trained in innovating and applying cutting-edge computational modelling techniques, and communicating their methods and advances across disciplinary boundaries to academics, industry and the public.


The direct economic impact of the centre and its students will initially arise from the generation of IP, and commercialisation and implementation of the scientific advances produced in the research of the centre. Students will interact directly with industry on a number of occasions, including the summer project, placements and industrial co-supervision; each of those allowing for direct impact within the partner firm, and realisation of step changes leading to economic and societal impact. NGCM students and graduates can be directly involved in this, for example through provision of consulting agreements and creation of spin-off companies - the University of Southampton and its business incubation programme have been rated amongst the best worldwide in generating successful spin-offs.

We expect economic impact to peak first in the NGCM focus sectors including UK aerospace and maritime industry, materials, autonomous systems, medicine and health care, before penetrating into most other fields and boosting wealth creation in general.

In the medium term (5 to 15 years), increased computational skills and the development of a culture of computational professionalism will enhance the efficiency and performance of UK businesses and organisations that employ or interact with alumni of the centre. Former NGCM students who chose an academic career path will help to proliferate modern computational professionalism through their teaching and training of future generations of undergraduate students. The timescales for impact will be accelerated due to the use of and engagement with open sources projects and approaches.


For the academic community there will be threefold direct impact.

First the centre will deliver and train a cohort of highly skilled computational researchers with specialist expertise in engineering and the physical sciences. These researchers will form the core of an advanced computing community within UK research for decades to come, contributing towards the health of the academic disciplines within which they innovate, and developing inter-disciplinary links and networks and fostering multi-disciplinary research areas and communication.

Second, increased professionalism makes computational research very much more effective to conduct, more reproducible, and allows practitioners to fully exploit the potential power of this emerging discipline.

Third, the researchers trained within the centre, and the community they drive, will enhance the knowledge economy by the development of new computational knowledge and techniques, and the scientific advancement that follows from the development of these new and innovative methodologies.


In addition to developing the NGCM cohorts of students, the centre will train non-NGCM CDT students and experienced researchers from industry (for example through participation in the summer academy), and engage more widely with the broader computational community and support computational professional development in and out of academia.


Societal impact of more widely spread computational professionalism and improved computational modelling includes more cost-effective and innovative engineering and science research and development, enhanced health care and quality of life, more effective public services and policies, increased wealth generation and better economic competitiveness of the UK; including the ability to attract investment from global business to the UK due its advanced computational modelling skill base and expertise.