Dr Christine Braban

Environmental Physicist

Current work

UK Eutrophying and Acidifying Atmospheric Pollutants, UKEAP: Project Coordinator of the UKEAP monitoring network which measures acidifying and eutrophying pollutant concentrations in the UK rural environment.

Ammonia Abatement using agroforestry and other methods: Part of a team investigating and quantifying the effectiveness of ammonia recapture by trees and other methods. Project is also exploring the knock-on benefits of ammonia mitigation using modelling, laboratory and field experiments.

Nitroeurope IP Component 4: Landscape measurement and verification task: The C4 project uses a Scottish landscape study area to look at nitrogen flows at the landscape scale through the atmosphere and in the hydrological system.

Simple Calculation of Atmospheric Impact Lmits-Combustion (SCAIL-Agriculture and SCAIL-Combustion). In collaboration with Jacobs Consultancy, development and maintenance of a screening tool for assessing impacts of trace gas sources on local habitats funded by SNIFFER. SCAIL-Combustion completed in 2010. SCAIL-Agriculture re-development in progress for 2011-12.

Global Seabird Ammonia and Bird Island

• Part of a team putting together the first global seabird ammonia emission inventory. I am supporting ammonia measurement campaigns and laboratory.
• PI on BAS-CEH CGS projects, which sent two scientists to Bird Island, South Georgia for the 2010-11 field season. Julia Schmale (MPI Mainz) and Sim Tang (CEH at Edinburgh) carried out detailed ammonia, ecosystem and atmospheric aerosol measurements to understand the role of ammonia plumes in the remote South Atlantic.

Development and deployment of instrumentation

Chemical Ionisation Mass Spectrometry (CIMS) to measure trace atmospheric gases: The new CEH chemical ionisation mass spectrometer (CIMS) is undergoing development and testing and is due to be deployed in 2011- 2012 to measure HNO3, HONO and PAN for specific field campaigns.

AiRRmonia:  Two instruments to measure atmospheric ammonia: one instrument was deployed to Whim. Both AiRRmonias were recently deployed to Bird Island, South Georgia.

Research interests

Laboratory and field measurements of trace gases and atmospheric modelling to understand processes occurring in the environment with a particular focus on nitrogen species. I am interested in all scales of environmental science from the molecular to global.

Previously my research has covered:

• heterogeneous chemistry
• aerosol thermodynamics
• infrared spectroscopy
• halogen chemistry and the evolution of volcanic plumes
• mass spectrometry

Brief CV

2008-current: Environmental Physicist, CEH Edinburgh

2004-2008: NERC Postdoctoral Research Associate, University of Cambridge:

• Halogen chemistry in volcanic plumes
• Heterogeneous chemistry of reactive species on model tropospheric aerosol

1999-2004: PhD, Environmental Chemistry University of Toronto, Canada, Thesis: Laboratory Studies of Model Tropospheric Aerosol Phase Transitions

1996-1999: Higher Scientific Officer, DERA, Salisbury

1995: MSc, Analytical Chemistry, University of Aberdeen and University of Huelva, Spain

1994: BA Hons., Metallurgy and the Science of Materials (2 ii) University of Oxford, UK

Selected publications

See also the NERC Open Research Archive.

von Bobrutzki, K., Braban C.F., Famulari, D., Jones, S.K., Sutton, M.A., Nemitz, E., T. Blackall, T., Smith, T.E.L., Blom, M., Coe, H., Gallagher, W., Ghalaieny, M., McGillen, M.M. R, Percival, C. J., Whitehead J. D., Ellis, R., Murphy, J., Mohacsi, A., Pogany, A., Rantanen, S., (2010). Field Inter-comparison of Eleven Ammonia Measurement Techniques, Atmos. Meas. Tech., 3, 91-112

Pradhan, M., Kalberer, M. Griffiths, P.T., Braban, C.F. Pope, F.D., Cox, R.A., Lambert, R.M. (2010.) Uptake of Gaseous Hydrogen Peroxide by Submicrometer Titanium Dioxide Aerosol as a Function of Relative Humidity. Environmental Science & Technology, 2010, 44, (4), 1360-1365

Braban, C.F., Lawrence, H., Tang, Y.S., Fowler, D., Vincent, K., Sutton, M.A., Cape, J.N., Smith, R.I., Stedman, J., Bealey, W.J., Leaver, D., Donovan, B. (2009.) UK Eutrophying and Acidifying Atmospheric Pollutants network (UKEAP). A Review for Defra.

Roberts, T.J., et al. (2009). Modelling reactive halogen formation and ozone depletion in volcanic plumes. Chemical Geology, 263(1-4), 151-163

Braban, C.F., et al. (2003). Phase transitions of malonic and oxalic acid aerosols. Journal of Physical Chemistry A, 107(34), 6594-6602.

Braban, C.F., and J. P. D. Abbatt (2004). A study of the phase transition behavior of internally mixed ammonium sulfate-malonic acid aerosols. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, 4, 1451-1459.