Facillitators

Zamin Kanji was born and raised in Mombasa, Kenya, where he completed high school after which he moved to Canada to complete a Bachelor’s degree with a specialist and honours in chemistry at Queen's University. In 2003 he joined Jon Abbatt’s group (Dept. of Chem.) at the University of Toronto to pursue a MSc (2006) and PhD (2009), where he researched aerosol particle impacts on heterogeneous nucleation of ice clouds in laboratory experiments. After this he shifted focus onto mixed-phase clouds during his post-doc in the group of Ulrike Lohmann at ETH – Zurich from 2009-2012. He then moved as an NSERC fellow to Environment and Climate Change Canada where he worked in the air quality division on aerosol mass spectrometry. In 2013, he accepted a group leader/senior scientist position in the Experimental Atmospheric Physics group at ETH Zurich and has been leading his own research program since. Zamin’s focus on aerosol physics and chemistry and their link to cloud microphysics have fueled his interests in researching the impact of aerosol composition and morphology on liquid and ice cloud formation as his active area of research. He currently focusses on laboratory and field measurements, including instrument development within his research group.

Jeffrey Geddes is an atmospheric chemist and assistant professor at Boston University. He earned his PhD in chemistry from the University of Toronto, where his thesis focused on making field measurements of reactive nitrogen oxide fluxes above forest canopies. For his postdoc at Dalhousie University and MIT, Jeff moved into atmospheric modeling and satellite remote sensing. He continues to develop his interests in biosphere-atmosphere-chemistry interactions with his group at Boston University, focusing on improving parameterizations of ozone dry deposition to terrestrial ecosystems, and exploring how contemporary changes in land use and land cover can compete in their impacts on global air quality. He also operates a network of ground-based remote sensing instruments that is used to evaluate and advance satellite remote sensing of ground level air quality. In addition to his research and teaching on atmospheric chemistry and remote sensing, Jeff is co-chair of the Chemistry-Ecosystem-Climate Working Group for the GEOS-Chem model, a Science Team Member of both the TEMPO and GEMS geostationary satellite instrument missions, and a member of the WMO Steering Committee on Global Total Atmospheric Deposition.

Dr. Cora Young is an Associate Professor and the Rogers Chair in Chemistry at York University in Toronto, Canada. Dr. Young’s research team focuses on the development and use of state-of-the-science analytical techniques to probe chemical mechanisms relevant to air quality (both outdoor and indoor), pollutant fate, and climate change. She has published over 60 papers in the peer-reviewed literature and was recently named as one of Chemical and Engineering News’ Talented 12. Her work has been widely covered in the media and she enthusiastically works with community organizations and the media to ensure effective communication of environmental chemistry concepts.

Sarah Styler obtained her BSc, MSc, and PhD from the University of Toronto and conducted postdoctoral research at the Leibniz Institute for Tropospheric Research in Leipzig, Germany. She began her independent career at the University of Alberta in 2015; in 2019, she was named a Tier 2 Canada Research Chair in Atmospheric Chemistry. In Summer 2020, she moved to McMaster University, where she is Assistant Professor of Environmental Chemistry. Her research group focuses on chemistry on atmospheric surfaces, including desert/urban dust, wildfire particulate matter, and cultural heritage objects.

Rachel Chang is an Associate Professor at Dalhousie where she holds a Canada Research Chair in Atmospheric Science. Rachel completed all her education at University of Toronto with a BASc in Engineering Science and an MASc in Chemical Engineering under the supervision of Professors Greg Evans and Jon Abbatt. Her PhD was completed with Jon Abbatt where she studied the ability of the organic component of ambient particles to absorb water as well as the sources and chemical composition of Arctic aerosol. She was an NSERC post-doctoral fellow at Harvard University with Steve Wofsy where she constrained methane emissions from permafrost regions using aircraft measurements over Alaska. Her research focuses on air–water exchange processes and their contributions aerosol and CCN populations in marine and arctic environments with a focus on understanding the physics and chemistry of marine fog.