Prof. Gordon Blair

My current research interests focus on the role of digital technology in supporting environmental science. This includes new forms of environmental monitoring and data acquisition, including the role of Internet of Things technology, new forms of computational infrastructure to support the storage and processing of such data, specifically using cloud computing, and new forms of analysing and making sense of this data using data science and AI. I am particularly interested in the role of virtual labs in supporting this end-to-end pipeline and in enabling a new kind of science that is more open, collaborative and integrative. Most recently, through my senior fellowship and CEEDS, I have become interested in the role of digital twins in supporting environmental science.

This all builds on a strong legacy of research in distributed systems, having been involved since the inception of the field in the early 1980s. My core research focused on the middleware architectures that underpin complex distributed systems applications and services, including examination of key distributed properties such as interoperability and how these can be achieved in the complex and dynamic distributed systems of today.

Prof. Gordon Blair is Head of Environmental Digital Strategy at UKCEH. He is also a Distinguished Professor of Distributed Systems at Lancaster University where he holds a part-time post (20%). He is also Co-Director of the Centre of Excellence in Environmental Data Science (CEEDS), a joint initiative between UKCEH and Lancaster University.