people

Professor Paul Vickers (Northumbria University) — Project Lead

Paul is Professor of Computer Science and Sonification. He carries out teaching and research in the computing domain where it intersects with creative digital media. His primary research area is sonification and auditory display with a particular interest in how the aesthetic properties of scientific artefacts affect how they may be used, that is, how people interact with and experience them them.

Paul is currently President of ICAD, the International Community for Auditory Display and has previously served as an ICAD Board Member 2004-2012, 2015-2018, 2019–2022. In 2019 he hosted the International Conference on Auditory Display.

With Bennett Hogg, Paul led the Leverhulme Trust Research Project “RADICAL” (2021–2024) which sought to understand sonification listening and experience at a fundamental level.

Dr Daniel Ratliff (Northumbria University) — Project Co-Lead

Dan is Assistant Professor of Mathematics. He is an Applied Mathematician with a small obsession on waves across physics – from the smaller polymer scales of statistical mechanics right up to waves in Near-Earth space. The running theme through everything he does is Nonlinear Waves and the PDE-based modelling associated with that. His field of expertise is water waves and hydrodynamics, but he has dabbled in many other wave systems since.

Dr Lucy Whalley (Northumbria University) — Project Co-Lead

Lucy is Assistant Professor of Physics. Her research uses solid state physics, quantum chemistry and high-perforance computing to investigate why particular materials can efficiently generate energy from sunlight (solar cells), or repeatedly store and release energy (rechargeable batteries). She is Fellow of the Software Sustainability Institute. Lucy was previously a PhD student and post-doc in the Materials Design Group at Imperial College London, where she was awarded the Thomas Young Centre at Imperial award for here thesis “Defects and distortions in hybrid halide perovskites”.

Lucy is a qualified teacher in post-compulsory education and currently teaches computational physics and research computing skills at UG and PG level. She is a topic editor at the Journal of Open Source Software, and has a broader interest in how we can improve research practice in the computational sciences, with a focus on working openly and software publishing. Her research is supported by the Materials Chemistry Consortium, where she serves as a committee member.

You can read more about Lucy’s interest at her personal website.

TBA (Northumbria University) — Post Doctoral Research Fellow

We’re currently seeking two outstanding researchers to join the project, one at Northumbria University and one at Newcastle University. If you would like to apply, please see our hiring page

Dr Bennett Hogg (Newcastle University) — Project Co-Lead

Bennett is Senior Lecturer in Music. He is a composer, improviser, and cultural theorist, with particular interests in electroacoustic music, environmental arts, and free improvisation. As a theorist Bennett’s particular interests are in the relationships between the human body and technology, the human voice, the mid-twentieth-century avant-garde in music, literature and the fine arts, and artistic perspectives on and engagements with the natural environment.

He was Principal Investigator of the AHRC-funded research project Landscape Quartet, and was involved in running projects as part of AHRC-funded “Northumbrian Exchanges” (PI Eric Cross), and has project involvement with AHRC-funded “Digital Originals” (Northumbria University and Newcastle Culture Lab) and “Creative Exchanges” (Culture Lab, Newcastle).

With Paul Vickers, Paul led Bennett co-led the Leverhulme Trust Research Project “RADICAL” (2021–2024) which sought to understand sonification listening and experience at a fundamental level.

Dr Christopher Harrison (Newcastle University) — Project Co-Lead

Chris is Reader in Astrophysics and currently holds a UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship at Newcastle University, working in the Astrophysics and Observational Cosmology group. He is an observational astronomer with the main goal of understanding how galaxies formed, and with a particular interest in the role of growing supermassive black holes (i.e., Active Galactic Nuclei; AGN) and galaxy dynamics. Towards this he uses a suite of observational facilities across the world (and in space!) covering the electromagnetic spectrum, to study both nearby and distant galaxies. Chris also conducts research into how sonification can be used to enhance scientific discovery, make science more accessible and make science communication more immersive. A summary of his research activities can be found on his personal website.

Chris has a strong interest in public engagement and accessibility to science. This includes the creation of educational exhibitions, activities and workshops, and leading international engagement projects.

TBA (Newcastle University) — Post Doctoral Research Associate

We’re currently seeking two outstanding researchers to join the project, one at Newcastle University and one at Northumbria University. If you would like to apply, please see our hiring page