Dr Matt Hawcroft

Matt Hawcroft is a climate scientist with an interest in understanding future uncertainty in climate model projections and how, in spite of such uncertainty, we can distil societally useful information at a variety of scales.

His current research focusses on evaluating links between future large-scale circulation changes and high-impact, small-scale events, such as extratropical storms, in order to improve our ability to understand the impact of changes in the frequency and intensity of these events. He joined the School of Geography and the Environment in March 2025 as a Daphne Jackson Fellow, funded by the Royal Society.

Matt's career started outside science. He has a degree in Law from the University of Cambridge, then qualified as a solicitor, practising corporate law in the City. He then returned to study, reading for a degree in Geography at Keble College, Oxford. After a short stint as a Research Assistant in SoGE, he moved to the University of Reading to undertake a PhD in Meteorology. His thesis evaluated the ability of HiGEM, a version of the UK Met Office model, to represent extratropical storms.

Since finishing his PhD, he spent 3 years as a Research Fellow at the University of Exeter and a further 3 years as a Senior Research Fellow, employed by the University of Southern Queensland, but based at the Met Office in Exeter. In these two roles, his research spanned large and small-scale climate features, with a particular focus on investigating, at the process level, sources and implications of model biases and their impacts on the ability of those models to produce accurate predictions and projections, at seasonal to climate timescales.

Matt's current research ties together themes from his prior work and his interest in law and policy brings a particular focus to the outcomes of his research.

Before starting his current Fellowship, Matt had a career break to prioritise family commitments. The Daphne Jackson Trust offers retraining fellowships to researchers who have had time out of academia. Matt's fellowship is funded by the Royal Society.

HILLY - Daphne Jackson Trust/Royal Society - March 2025-March 2028.

Recent Research

Northern Australia Climate Program. February 2019 - November 2021
IMPALA (NERC Large Grant). May 2015 - January 2019
DyARES (NERC Pump-Priming Grant). January 2018 - February 2018.

• Liang, J., Yong, Y., and Hawcroft, M.K. 2023. Long-term trends in atmospheric rivers over East Asia. Climate Dynamics 60 (3-4), 643-666

   

• Lavender, S.L., Cowan, T., Hawcroft, M.K., and 15 other authors 2022. The Northern Australia Climate Program: Overview and Selected Highlights. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 103 (11), E2492-E2505
  
   
• Hawcroft, M.K., Lavender, S., Copsey, D., Milton, S., Rodríguez, J., Tennant, W., Webster, S. and Cowan, T. 2021. The benefits of ensemble prediction for forecasting an extreme event: The Queensland floods of February 2019. Monthly Weather Review 149 (7), 2391-2408
  
   
• Kang, S.M., Xie, S-P., Shin, Y., Kim, H., Hwang, Y-T., Stuecker, M.F., Xiang, B. and Hawcroft, M.K. 2020. Walker circulation response to extratropical radiative forcing Science Advances 6 (47)
  
   
• Kang, S.M., Hawcroft, M.K., and 17 further authors 2019. Extratropical–tropical interaction model intercomparison project (ETIN-MIP): Protocol and initial results. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 100 (12), 2589-2606 2019
  
   
• Hawcroft, M.K., Walsh, E., Zappa, G. and Hodges, K.I. 2018. Significantly increased extreme precipitation expected in Europe and North America from extratropical storms. Environmental Research Letters 13 124006
  
   
• Hawcroft, M.K., Haywood, J.M., Collins, M. and Jones, A. 2018. The contrasting climate response to tropical and extratropical energy perturbations. Climate Dynamics, 51(9-10), 3231-3249
  
   
• Jones, A.C., Haywood, J.M., Dunstone, N., Emanuel, K., Hawcroft, M.K., Hodges, K.I. and Jones. A. 2017. Solar geoengineering and North Atlantic tropical cyclone frequency. Nature Communications 8(1), 1382
  
   
• Stephens, G. et al, inc Hawcroft, M.K.. 2016. The curious nature of the hemispheric symmetry of the Earth’s water and energy balances. Current Climate Change Reports, 2(4), 135-147
  
   
• Hawcroft, M.K., Collins, M., Haywood, J., Jones, A., Jones, A.C. and Stephens, G. 2016. Southern Ocean albedo, cross-equatorial energy transport and the ITCZ: global impacts of biases in a coupled model. Climate Dynamics, 48(7-8), 2279-2295
  
   
• Hawcroft, M.K., Dacre, H.F., Forbes, R.M., Hodges, K.I., Shaffrey, L.C. and Stein, T.M. 2016. Using satellite data and reanalysis to evaluate the representation of diabatic processes in extratropical cyclones in a climate model. Climate Dynamics, 48(7-8), 2255-2278
  
   
• Hawcroft, M.K., Shaffrey, L.C., Hodges, K.I. and Dacre, H.F. 2015. Can climate models represent the precipitation associated with extratropical cyclones? Climate Dynamics, 45(7), 1727-1738
  
   
• Zappa, G., Hawcroft, M.K., Shaffrey, L.C., Black, E. and Brayshaw, D.J. 2014. Extratropical cyclones and the projected decline of winter Mediterranean precipitation in the CMIP5 models. Climate Dynamics, 45(7-8), 1727-1738
  
   
• Hawcroft, M.K., Shaffrey, L.C., Hodges, K.I. and Dacre, H.F. 2012. How much Northern Hemisphere precipitation is associated with extratropical cyclones? Geophysical Research Letters, DOI:10.1029/2012GL053866
  
   
• Dacre, H.F., Hawcroft, M.K., Stringer, M. and Hodges, K.I. 2012. An educational database of extratropical cyclone characteristics. Bull. Amer. Met. Soc., 93(10), 1497- 1502.