Dr Natasha Jeffrey

Associate Professor

Department: Mathematics, Physics and Electrical Engineering

Research Themes and Scholarly Interests

My research studies solar flares, huge releases of energy in the Sun’s atmosphere. Solar flares provide us with an astrophysical laboratory for understanding processes such as magnetic reconnection and turbulence, and the production and properties of energetic particles. My work uses high energy observations (X-ray, EUV) to study flares and energetic particles at the Sun, and the creation of kinetic models to study particle acceleration and particle and X-ray transport effects in flares.��

My current list of publications can be found .

My current CV (updated January 2022) can be found .

I obtained my PhD in solar physics in 2014 at the University of Glasgow on the��before becoming a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Glasgow. In 2019, I joined ��ϲ�� as a Vice-Chancellor Fellow/Lecturer.

I am currently the Chair of the council.

Between 2016 and 2018 I received the following prizes for my research: European Geophysical Union (EGU) Solar-Terrestrial Early Career Researcher Prize, European Physical Society (EPS) Solar Physics Division (ESPD) Early Career Researcher Prize, and the EPS Plasma Physics Thesis Prize.��

Selected current (and previous) grants/awards:

UKRI Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) Consolidated Grant (2024-26) for “Determining Solar Flare Hard X-ray Directivity using Stereoscopic Observations with Solar Orbiter/STIX” (£248,301).��

UKRI Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) New Applicant Grant (2021-24)��for “Exploring the connection between solar flare energetic electrons observed at the Sun and in the heliosphere” (£372,452).��

Franco-British Council Alliance Hubert Curien Programme (2021-22)

“Solar flare turbulence”��£2240 per year (two years) for workshop organisation in the UK and France related to understanding solar flare turbulence at the Sun and in the heliosphere.

��

International Space Science Institute (ISSI) project (2022-24)

"Measuring Solar Flare X-ray Directivity using Stereoscopic Observations with SolO/STIX and X-ray instrumentation at Earth".��In this project, we will bring together X-ray instrument team members to calibrate X-ray data from different instrumentation at Earth and from STIX. This will allow us to produce reliable HXR directivity observations (first in decades) and provide an important link to the flare-accelerated electron angular distribution (a key link to the acceleration mechanism).

In 2019-2020 I also led International Space Science Institute (ISSI) Bern team with Dr Frederic Effenberger (Helmholtz Centre, Potsdam, Germany) with the aim to understand the connection between different populations of energetic particles produced at the Sun and in the heliosphere, and how they can be used to further our understanding of astrophysical plasma processes and astrophysical particle acceleration in general.��

��

Key Publications

Exploring the Origin of Solar Energetic Electrons II: Investigating Turbulent Coronal Acceleration, Pallister, R., Jeffrey, N., Stores, M. 25 Feb 2025, In: Astrophysical Journal
A Modelling Investigation for Solar Flare X-ray Stereoscopy with Solar Orbiter/STIX and Earth Orbiting Missions, Jeffrey, N., Krucker, S., Stores, M., Kontar, E., Saint-Hilaire, P., Battaglia, A., Hayes, L., Collier, H., Veronig, A., Su, Y., Tadepalli, S., Xia, F. 1 Apr 2024, In: Astrophysical Journal
First joint X-ray solar microflare observations with NuSTAR and Solar Orbiter/STIX, Bajnoková, N., Hannah, I., Cooper, K., Krucker, S., Grefenstette, B., Smith, D., Jeffrey, N., Duncan, J. 5 Sep 2024, In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Advances in 3D solar flare modelling, Druett, M., Jeffrey, N. 1 Oct 2023, In: Astronomy and Geophysics
An Anisotropic Density Turbulence Model from the Sun to 1 au Derived from Radio Observations, Kontar, E., Emslie, A., Clarkson, D., Chen, X., Chrysaphi, N., Azzollini, F., Jeffrey, N., Gordovskyy, M. 1 Oct 2023, In: The Astrophysical Journal
Exploring the Origin of Solar Energetic Electrons. I. Constraining the Properties of the Acceleration Region Plasma Environment, Pallister, R., Jeffrey, N. 20 Nov 2023, In: The Astrophysical Journal
Source positions of an interplanetary type III radio burst and anisotropic radio-wave scattering, Chen, X., Kontar, E., Chrysaphi, N., Zhang, P., Krupar, V., Musset, S., Maksimovic, M., Jeffrey, N., Azzollini, F., Vecchio, A. Dec 2023, In: Astronomy and Astrophysics
Spectral and Imaging Diagnostics of Spatially Extended Turbulent Electron Acceleration and Transport in Solar Flares, Stores, M., Jeffrey, N., McLaughlin, J. 29 Mar 2023, In: The Astrophysical Journal
The existence of hot X-ray onsets in solar flares, Battaglia, A., Hudson, H., Warmuth, A., Collier, H., Jeffrey, N., Caspi, A., Dickson, E., Saqri, J., Purkhart, S., Veronig, A., Harra, L., Krucker, S. Nov 2023, In: Astronomy and Astrophysics
The Large Imaging Spectrometer for Solar Accelerated Nuclei (LISSAN): A Next-Generation Solar γ-ray Spectroscopic Imaging Instrument Concept, Ryan, D., Musset, S., Reid, H., Krucker, S., Battaglia, A., Bréelle, E., Chapron, C., Collier, H., Dahlin, J., Denker, C., Dickson, E., Gallagher, P., Hannah, I., Jeffrey, N., Kašparová, J., Kontar, E., Laurent, P., Maloney, S., Massa, P., Massone, A., Mrozek, T., Pailot, D., Pallu, M., Pesce-Rollins, M., Piana, M., Plotnikov, I., Rouillard, A., Shih, A., Smith, D., Steslicki, M., Stiefel, M., Warmuth, A., Verma, M., Veronig, A., Vilmer, N., Vocks, C., Volpara, A. 23 Nov 2023, In: Aerospace

Current and Recent Projects

STFC Consolidated Grant for the Solar and Space Physics Group at ��ϲ��, McLaughlin, J. (Principal Investigator), Jeffrey, N. (Co Investigator), Science and Technologies Facilities Council, 01/04/23 - 31/03/26, £1,289,803.00

PGR Supervision

Samuel Carter Constraining the processes that accelerate and transport solar flare energetic electrons from the Sun’s inner atmosphere to the Earth Start Date: 01/10/2023