Dr Jan De Rydt

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

• His UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship (2022-2026) 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, the project 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. Jan leads Work Package 4, which will contribute to projections of basal meltwater, iceberg calving and surface runoff from the Antarctic Ice Sheet for a range of future climate scenarios.
• Jan is a co-I on the PRECISE project (2023-2029), funded by the Danish Novo Nordisk Foundation. PRECISE will develop and improve models for how the ice sheets contribute to rising sea levels. The project will develop deep learning tools to emulate ocean dynamics, thereby reducing the computational cost of expensive coupled ice-ocean simulations whilst capturing key interactions between ice-sheet and ocean dynamics.

• 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
• Ocean tides trigger ice shelf rift growth and calving, Marsh, O., Arthern, R., De Rydt, J. 24 Jul 2025, In: Nature Communications
• 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

• Theoretical Physics PhD
• Physics MSc
• Geography Studies (Science) MPhil

• Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
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