Dr Jan De Rydt

Associate Professor

Department: Geography and Environmental Sciences

Jan De Rydt is a UKRI Future Leaders Fellow at Northumbria University, where he conducts research in polar glaciology and oceanography. He is interested in physical processes that govern the dynamics of glaciers and ice caps, and their interactions with the climate system. He uses a combination of theory, measurements and numerical models to simulate present-day and future changes of the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets, and understand their complex intereactions with the surrounding ocean. His work aims to enable more robust forecasts of sea level rise over the next decades to centuries, and advance our understanding of the interactions between ice sheets and the global climate system.

Research group

> Dr Brad Reed, May 2023-present. Brad is working on coupled ice-ocean modelling of the Amundsen Sea in West Antarctica.

> Dr Jo Zanker, August 2023-present. Jo is using numerical simulations to assess the importance of Greenland's remaining ice shelves for the future dynamics of the Ice Sheet.

> Dr Qing Qin, October 2023-present. Qing is working on hindcast and forecast simulations of the Antarctic Ice Sheet and the quantification of future freshwater fluxes into the Southern Ocean.

> Dr Sam Hartharn-Evans, May 2025-present. Sam is working on small-scale processes at the ice-ocean interface using numerical models and lab experiments.

Biography

2018-present	Faculty of Engineering and Environmental Science, Northumbria University, Newcastle, UK
2011-2018	British Antarctic Survey, Cambridge, UK
2010-2011	Department of Geography, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
2006-2010	Department of Physics and Astronomy, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Beligium

Campus Address

Ellison Building A
Northumbria University
Newcastle Upon Tyne
NE1 8ST

+441912273209

Email Jan

Research Themes and Scholarly Interests

Jan De Rydt is involved with several research projects, funded by the European Comission and UK Research and Innovation.

Jan is the PI of a UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship (2022-2026), which aims to address three outstanding challenges in ice flow modelling to enable the first robust uncertainty quantification of Antarctic ice loss for a range of climate scenarios between present-day and 2300. The first challenge is the initial value problem of predicting the evolution of the ice sheet given an uncertain estimate of its present-day state. The second challenge is the structural problem of unknown or uncertain physical parameters. Here the focus is on improving the misfit between modelled and observed estimates of Antarctic mass loss between 1990 and 2020. The third challenge is the boundary value problem of assessing future changes in the state of the Ice Sheet due to uncertain external forcing. The project will produce ensemble forecasts and a stochastic error quantification of Antarctic mass loss between 2020 and 2300.

OCEAN:ICE (EU Horizon Europe, 2022-2026) assesses the impacts of key Antarctic Ice Sheet and Southern Ocean processes on Planet Earth, via their influence on sea level rise, deep water formation, ocean circulation and climate. Using the ice sheet model Úa, and coupled ice-ocean model Úa-MITgcm, Jan will quantify AIS melt sensitivity to climate forcing with the aim to reduce the ‘deep uncertainty’ in freshwater flux and sea level rise projections to 2300. He will contribute to projections of basal meltwater, iceberg calving and surface runoff from the Antarctic Ice Sheet for a range of future climate scenarios.

Key Publications

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
Coupling framework (1.0) for the Úa (2023b) ice sheet model and the FESOM-1.4 z-coordinate ocean model in an Antarctic domain, Richter, O., Timmermann, R., Gudmundsson, H., De Rydt, J. 19 May 2025, In: Geoscientific Model Development
A framework for estimating the anthropogenic part of Antarctica’s sea level contribution in a synthetic setting, Bradley, A., Bett, D., Holland, P., Williams, C., Arthern, R., Rydt, J. 11 Mar 2024, In: Communications Earth and Environment
Author Correction: A framework for estimating the anthropogenic part of Antarctica’s sea level contribution in a synthetic setting, Bradley, A., Bett, D., Holland, P., Williams, C., Arthern, R., Rydt, J. 14 Aug 2024, In: Communications Earth and Environment
Experimental design for the Marine Ice Sheet–Ocean Model Intercomparison Project – phase 2 (MISOMIP2), De Rydt, J., Jourdain, N., Nakayama, Y., van Caspel, M., Timmermann, R., Mathiot, P., Asay-Davis, X., Seroussi, H., Dutrieux, P., Galton-Fenzi, B., Holland, D., Reese, R. 24 Sep 2024, In: Geoscientific Model Development
Future Freshwater Fluxes From the Antarctic Ice Sheet, Coulon, V., De Rydt, J., Gregov, T., Qin, Q., Pattyn, F. 16 Dec 2024, In: Geophysical Research Letters
Geometric amplification and suppression of ice-shelf basal melt in West Antarctica, De Rydt, J., Naughten, K. 22 Apr 2024, In: The Cryosphere
Short- and long-term variability of the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets, Hanna, E., Topál, D., Box, J., Buzzard, S., Christie, F., Hvidberg, C., Morlighem, M., De Santis, L., Silvano, A., Colleoni, F., Sasgen, I., Banwell, A., van den Broeke, M., DeConto, R., De Rydt, J., Goelzer, H., Gossart, A., Gudmundsson, G., Lindbäck, K., Miles, B., Mottram, R., Pattyn, F., Reese, R., Rignot, E., Srivastava, A., Sun, S., Toller, J., Tuckett, P., Ultee, L. 1 Mar 2024, In: Nature Reviews Earth & Environment
The ice dynamic and melting response of Pine Island Ice Shelf to calving, Bradley, A., De Rydt, J., Bett, D., Dutrieux, P., Holland, P. 20 Apr 2023, In: Annals of Glaciology
Unavoidable future increase in West Antarctic ice-shelf melting over the twenty-first century, Naughten, K., Holland, P., De Rydt, J. 1 Nov 2023, In: Nature Climate Change
The Influence of Pine Island Ice Shelf Calving on Basal Melting, Bradley, A., Bett, D., Dutrieux, P., De Rydt, J., Holland, P. 9 Sep 2022, In: Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans