physics

Tamsin Edwards

Tamsin Edwards is a physics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Tamsin Edwards rather than just read about it. In short: Tamsin Edwards is a British climate scientist and Professor at King's College London. She is a popular science communicator and writes for the Public Library of Science (PLOS).

Key takeaways

Tamsin Edwards belongs to physics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Tamsin Edwards to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Tamsin Edwards from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Tamsin Edwards is a British climate scientist and Professor at King's College London. She is a popular science communicator and writes for the Public Library of Science (PLOS).

Early life and education Edwards became interested in physics after reading A Brief History of Time. The daughter of Michael Edwards, she completed A-Levels in Physics, Chemistry and Maths at St Margaret's School, in Exeter. She studied physics in the School of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Manchester. She completed a PhD in Particle Physics at the University of Manchester under the supervision of Brian Cox. Her thesis investigated the production of Z bosons, detected by their subsequent decay to muons, using data collected at the Tevatron.

Research and career Edwards joined the Open University as a lecturer, working in the Palaeoenvironmental Change team. She uses computer models to predict and study climate change, with a particular interest in the impact on sea level rise of changes in the Antarctic ice sheet. She studied how a glacier's grounding line (the point at which is separates from a continent's bedrock and floats into the sea) affects the rate of flow of glaciers, and estimated the effects of positive feedback. In 2017 Edwards joined King's College London as a lecturer in geography. She will be a lead author for Chapter 9 (Ocean, cryosphere, and sea level change) of the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Edwards writes a popular science blog hosted by the Public Library of Science (PLOS). She has written for The Guardian and contributed chapters to books about climate change. Working with the Met Office, Edwards created educational resources about sea level rise for the 2017 United Nations Climate Change Conference ("COP23"). In 2014 she gave a TEDx talk at CERN, How to Love Uncertainty in Climate Science. After fights between climate scientists and sceptics on Twitter in 2014, Edwards was part of a dinner party discussing how they could calm the debate. The dinner included David Rose and Richard A. Betts, and Edwards was the only woman. In 2015 she was celebrated as one of twenty women "making waves" at the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference. She won the 2016 British Science Association Charles Lyell Award for Environmental Sciences. She discussed how computer models can be used to predict ice sheet collapse and how to communicate uncertainty. In 2017 she was profiled in the HuffPost Australia's Breaking The Ice series. She is a speaker at the 2018 Bluedot Festival. Edwards has acted as a scientific consultant for the BBC. She was a consultant on the BBC's Climate Change by Numbers, which won an American Association for the Advancement of Science award for Science Journalism, and a 2015 award for "Best Presentation of Science in an Environment Issue" from EuroPAWS. She has appeared on BBC Radio 4 and BBC World Service. She was awarded the 2020 Climate Science Communications Award by the Royal Meteorological Society. On 28 January 2021, Edwards took part in a panel event of international experts called Climate Change: Why should we care?, organised by the Science Museum Group. In July 2023, at the Bluedot Festival, Edwards announced she has become a Professor at King’s College.

Selected publications Nick, Faezeh M.; Vieli, Andreas; Langer Andersen, Morten; Joughin, Ian; Payne, Anthony J; Edwards, Tamsin L.; Pattyn, Frank; van de Wal, Roderik (2013). "Future sea-level rise from Greenland's main outlet glaciers in a warming climate" (PDF). Nature. 497 (7448): 235–238. Bibcode:2013Natur.497..235N. doi:10.1038/nature12068. PMID 23657350. S2CID 4400824. Hawkins, Ed; Edwards, Tamsin; McNeall, Doug (2014). "Pause for thought" (PDF). Nature Climate Change. 4 (3): 154–156. Bibcode:2014NatCC...4..154H. doi:10.1038/nclimate2150. S2CID 85406377. Ritz, Catherine; Edwards, Tamsin L.; Durand, Gaël; Payne, Anthony J; Peyaud, Vincent; Hindmarsh, Richard C. A. (2015). "Potential sea-level rise from Antarctic ice-sheet instability constrained by observations" (PDF). Nature. 528 (7580): 115–118. Bibcode:2015Natur.528..115R. doi:10.1038/nature16147. PMID 26580020. S2CID 4462953. Edwards, Tamsin (4 December 2017). "Future of the Sea: Current and Future Impacts of Sea Level Rise on the UK". Foresight Future of the Sea project. Government Office for Science. Edwards, Tamsin L.; Brandon, Mark A.; Durand, Gaël; Edwards, Neil R.; Golledge, Nicholas R.; Holden, Philip B.; et al. (2019). "Revisiting Antarctic ice loss due to marine ice-cliff instability". Nature. 566 (7742): 58–64. Bibcode:2019Natur.566...58E. doi:10.1038/s41586-019-0901-4. hdl:1983/de5e9847-612f-42fb-97b0-5d7ff43d37b8. PMID 30728522. S2CID 59606547.

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Tamsin Edwards

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Tamsin Edwards claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In physics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Tamsin Edwards before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Tamsin Edwards ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Tamsin Edwards

In research: Tamsin Edwards appears in physics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Tamsin Edwards in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Tamsin Edwards is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1979 births, 21st-century British scientists, 21st-century British women scientists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Tamsin Edwards outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

Ask Teacher Smith questions about this articleOpens your AI tutor with a question about “Tamsin Edwards” →

Affiliate

Preply — study more efficiently by working with a personal tutor. 50% off.

How to study Tamsin Edwards in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Tamsin Edwards means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Tamsin Edwards out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Tamsin Edwards in simple terms?

Tamsin Edwards is a British climate scientist and Professor at King's College London. She is a popular science communicator and writes for the Public Library of Science (PLOS).

Why does Tamsin Edwards matter?

Because it connects several physics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Tamsin Edwards?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Tamsin Edwards.