Mini MFC Wednesday at Imperial on 12th February 2025

Title: Spatiotemporal Modelling of Ocean Drifters
Abstract: Ocean drifters are freely-floating buoys that provide a unique observational dataset measuring ocean surface currents and temperatures across the world’s ocean. The data are “Lagrangian” as each drifter is designed to move like a parcel of water at the surface – therefore traditional “Eulerian” methods from fluid dynamics and stochastic processes need to be adjusted for the way in which the data are collected. In this talk I will give a quick tour of statistical and machine learning ways in which we’ve done this, using for example stochastic differential equations, Markov chains, and natural gradient boosting – but there are certainly others and perhaps you might think of your own ideas to bring to your future research! All welcome, no prerequisite in depth knowledge of oceanography or statistics required.

In this session, we will raise awareness and explore the importance of EDI and Widening Participation; you will gain insights into the MFC CDT’s current action plan and be encouraged to critically review the current plans and reflect on how they align with your own experiences in the CDT. You will also learn practical, actionable steps to champion EDI and WP in the CDT and your wider research community.

The MFC CDT has secured a slot at the Great Exhibition Road Festival in London (7-8 June 2025). For more details, visit https://www.greatexhibitionroadfestival.co.uk/ .

In this session, you will explore how you can contribute to this major outreach event. You will learn about the current proposal, “Maths meets climate”, and have the opportunity to shape and enhance it further.