Rate My Professor Hayley Fowler

Professor Hayley Fowler is Professor of Climate Change Impacts and Head of the Water Engineering Group in the School of Engineering at Newcastle University. She holds a first-class BA Honours in Geography from the University of Cambridge (1996), an MSc with Distinction in Water Resource Systems Engineering from Newcastle University (1997), and a PhD on climate change impacts on water resources from Newcastle University (2000). Beginning her career at Newcastle University as a PhD student and teaching assistant (1997-2000), she progressed through roles including Research Associate (2001-2004), Senior Research Associate (2004-2008), Reader (2008-2012), and Professor since 2012. She has served as Director of the NERC ONE Planet Doctoral Training Programme (2019-2024) and Director of the Newcastle University Centre of Research Excellence in Climate and Environmental Resilience since 2020. Fowler has supervised 12 PhD students to completion and nine postdoctoral researchers, many of whom have obtained positions worldwide. She maintains visiting scientist collaborations at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (USA) and the University of New South Wales (Australia).

Her research centres on advancing physical understanding of precipitation extremes, particularly intense rainfall changes, and their implications for hydrological systems, flooding, and water resources under climate change. Fowler has pioneered probabilistic downscaling methods and contributed to tools like the UKCP09 Weather Generator. She leads a research group with six postdocs and ten PhD students and has authored over 160 peer-reviewed publications. Notable works include "Towards new design rainfall profiles for the United Kingdom" (Journal of Flood Risk Management, 2024), "The creation and climatology of a large independent rainfall event database for Great Britain" (International Journal of Climatology, 2023), and "Large-scale dynamics moderate impact-relevant changes to organised convective storms" (Communications Earth & Environment, 2023). Her accolades include the Royal Society Faraday Discovery Fellowship (2025), American Geophysical Union Fellowship (2018), Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award (2014-2019), European Academy of Sciences Fellowship (2021), Philip Leverhulme Prize (2011), and NERC Postdoctoral Fellowship (2006-2010). Fowler is an Associate Editor for Studia Geophysica et Geodaetica, has guest-edited special issues for leading journals, and delivered the British Science Association Joseph Lister Award Lecture (2012-2013).