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STEM Faculty

Meet the people who make up STEM Faculty.

James Holmes

James Holmes

Uk Space Agency Aurora Research Fellow

physical-sciences

Professional biography

2024 - present: Research Fellow

My research focuses on understanding the coupled dynamical, physical, and chemical processes that govern the atmospheres of Mars and, increasingly, Venus. I combine numerical modelling with satellite observations to investigate atmospheric behaviour and variability, while also developing machine-learning approaches for forecasting Martian weather. This work aims to improve our understanding of planetary climates and to support future robotic and human exploration of Mars.

2021 - 2024: UK Space Agency Aurora Research Fellow

Investigating interactions between the global dust and water cycles on Mars through an analysis of orbiter observations from the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) (among others) in preparation for the upcoming ExoMars Rover mission. This research will combine TGO observations with an internationally recognised Mars Global Circulation Model (GCM) utilising proven data assimilation techniques to give new insights into the martian dust and water cycles and providing a longer-term framework to support future Mars exploration missions such as Mars Sample Return.

2017 - 2021: Post Doctoral Research Associate

Working on a project to characterise the martian water cycle by assimilating ExoMars 2016 Trace Gas Orbiter data

2015 - 2017: Post Doctoral Research Associate

Working on the data assimilation work package of the Horizon 2020 UPWARDS: Understanding Planet Mars project.

2011-2015: PhD Research Student

Focusing on trace gas assimilation in the Martian atmosphere

Research interests

I am an Independent Research Fellow who primarily investigates atmospheric chemistry cycles on Mars and Venus using a combination of observations and computer modelling. My research is helping to investigate links between the atmospheric chemistry cycles and the main drivers of atmospheric processes, such as the dust and water cycles, by combining computer models with the latest observations from the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter mission alongside multiple other spacecraft missions.

  • Atmospheric chemistry cycles on Mars and Venus

  • Escape of water from the atmosphere of Mars

  • Global Circulation Modelling

  • Mesoscale Modelling

  • Data assimilation: combining retrievals with computer models

  • Forecasting of martian weather

  • Human exploration of Mars

Latest publications

Displaying 10 of 89 publications

  • Cohen, M., Holmes, J., Egan, J., Lewis, S. and Patel, M. R., 2026, ‘How long could volcanic plumes persist in the Venus atmosphere? Planetary Research, 1(2),’, https://oro.open.ac.uk/112496/.
  • Alday, J., González-Galindo, F., Belyaev, D. A., López-Valverde, M. n., Kossova, D., Thiemann, E. M. B., Evans, J. S., Fedorova, A. A., Jain, S., Holmes, J. A., Patel, M. R. and Forget, F., 2026, ‘Variability of the Martian Homopause: Insights from Global Climate Modelling and Empirical Estimates’, Space Science Reviews, 222(5), https://oro.open.ac.uk/111618/.
  • Barrett, A. M., Balme, M. R., Favaro, E. A., Woods, M. J., Malinowski, M., Elsarky, L., Rajendran, K., Holmes, J. A. and Patel, M. R., 2026, ‘Detecting and measuring Transverse Aeolian Ridges on Mars using deep learning’, Icarus, 449, https://oro.open.ac.uk/109102/.
  • Brines, A., López‐Valverde, M. A., Funke, B., González‐Galindo, F., Aoki, S., Thomas, I. R., Villanueva, G. L., Liuzzi, G., Erwin, J. T., Grabowski, U., Forget, F., Lopez‐Moreno, J. J., Rodriguez‐Gomez, J., Daerden, F., Trompet, L., Ristic, B., Patel, M. R., Holmes, J. A., Bellucci, G., Modak, A. and Vandaele, A. C., 2026, ‘Water Vapor Vertical Distribution on Mars After Six Years of TGO/NOMAD Solar Occultations: 1’, Global Climatology. Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets, 131(2), https://oro.open.ac.uk/108550/.
  • Foley, L., Lewis, S., Balme, M. and Holmes, J., 2025, ‘Impacts of mesoscale meteorology on the evolution of fluvial features in Lyot crater, Mars’, Icarus, 438, https://oro.open.ac.uk/104200/.
  • Conway, S. J., Bickel, V. T., Fenton, L. K., Patel, M. R., Carson, H. C., Blouin, A., Crevier, J., Blanc, E., Nguyen, B. N., Holmes, J. A., Jackson, B. and Roelofs, L., 2025, ‘A global survey for dust devil vortices on mars using MRO context camera images enabled by neural networks’, Planetary and Space Science, 259, https://oro.open.ac.uk/103530/.
  • Rajendran, K., Streeter, P. M., Lewis, S. R., Duffy, M. K. D., Holmes, J. A., Olsen, K. S., Korablev, O. and Patel, M. R., 2025, ‘Global Transport of Chlorine Species in the Martian Atmosphere and the Resulting Surface Distribution of Perchlorates’, Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets, 130(3), https://oro.open.ac.uk/103403/.
  • Uprety, S., Bennaceur, A., Gavidia-Calderon, C., Holmes, J., Patel, M. and Rajendran, K., 2025, ‘Weather Prediction on Mars as a Multivariate Time Series Forecasting Problem’, in Workshop on AI-driven Data Engineering and Reusability for Earth and Space Sciences (DARES’25), co-located with the 28th European Conference on Artificial Intelligence (ECAI 2025), 25 Oct 2025, Bologna, Italy., https://oro.open.ac.uk/106921/.
  • Cohen, M., Holmes, J., Lewis, S., Patel, M. and Lebonnois, S., 2025, ‘Three Worlds in One: Venus as a Natural Laboratory for the Effect of Rotation Period on Atmospheric Circulation’, The Astrophysical Journal Letters, 980(1), https://oro.open.ac.uk/102658/.
  • Shastri, V., Holmes, J. A., Patel, M. R. and Lewis, S. R., 2025, ‘Changes to water ice clouds in the martian north pole during high atmospheric dust levels’, in 18th UKPF Early Career Meeting (ECM), 13 Jan 2025, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK., https://oro.open.ac.uk/101757/.