Prof. Rebecca Garland recently joined the University of Pretoria as an Associate Professor at the Department of Geography, Geoinformatics and Meteorology. She is an NRF-rated researcher with over 20 years’ experience in research in the atmospheric science, atmospheric biogeochemistry, atmospheric chemistry, and climate change fields.

Her research interests focus on improving our understanding of air quality and atmospheric composition, and their impacts, in southern Africa using a variety of tools and data streams. Many of her projects have also worked at the science-policy interface, working to provide a strong evidence base for air quality management in South Africa, with newer projects increasingly working across Africa. Currently, she is Coordinating Lead Author for the Climate and Clean Air Coalition (CCAC) and UNEP Integrated Assessment of Air Pollution and Climate Change in Africa that will provide a framework of actions to improve air quality across the continent.

She is active in national and international working groups, with an aim to support and grow the atmospheric science community across Africa. This includes her roles as Co-Editor of the Clean Air Journal, Vice President of the South African Society for Atmospheric Sciences, Scientific Steering Committee of the International Global Atmospheric Chemistry (IGAC) Project, and in the development and growth of the IGAC regional working group African Group on Atmospheric Science (ANGA). Additionally, she is a member of the steering committee member of AfriqAir and MAP-AQ, as well as acting on the Science Advisory Group of the GAW Urban Research Meteorology and Environment (GURME) project and CCAC.

Prof. Garland received her PhD in Chemistry from the University of Colorado, Boulder (USA) focusing on laboratory studies of aerosol particles. Her PhD research focused on the impact of particle composition on chemistry and water update as well as developing empirical parameterizations for the relationship between aerosol particle composition, water uptake and optical properties. During her PhD she was also a graduate researcher at the Earth Systems Laboratory in NOAA (USA). She was a postdoctoral research in the Biogeochemistry Department at the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry (Germany), where she focused on field studies of the optical and biological properties of aerosol particles. After her postdoc, she was a AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellow working as an analyst in the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy in Washington DC, USA. Prof Garland joined the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (South Africa) in 2011. Working in the Climate and Air Quality Modelling Group, she established the current atmospheric composition, and climate change and health research areas in the group, as well as led the research focusing on aerosol particle impacts on climate in southern Africa.