Featured scientist: Prof Rebecca Garland

‘I work on better understanding atmospheric composition and air quality, specifically in southern Africa. Air pollution levels in South Africa often exceed the thresholds set by the national government – and high levels of pollution negatively impact human health and the environment. In South Africa, we have a mix of strong sources from human activities, many of which are from the combustion of fossil fuels (e.g., electricity generation, vehicles, and industrial activity), as well as strong natural sources of pollution (such as veldfires). In working towards improving air quality, our work focuses on understanding the drivers and impacts of pollution, as well as assessing the impacts of policies on pollution levels on a regional to urban scale,’ says Professor Rebecca M Garland of the Department of Geography, Geoinformatics and Meteorology at the University of Pretoria (UP) and NITheCS Branch head at UP.

Among others, Prof Garland is currently a member of the Scientific Advisory Panel of the Climate and Clean Air Coalition and the Scientific Steering Committee for International Global Atmospheric Chemistry (IGAC), and she was a coordinating lead author for the Climate and Clean Air Coalition and UNEP Integrated Assessment of Air Pollution and Climate Change in Africa. In addition, she is a founding member of the African group on Atmospheric Sciences (ANGA) under IGAC.

‘My group’s work also focuses broader than just air quality. We look at reactive species in the atmosphere, how they are changing from human activities and emissions, and how they in turn can impact on the environment and climate change.’

Prof Garland elaborates on the challenges relating to the work done locally: ‘In our field, most regions of Africa can be considered data scarce, and this includes South Africa. We have more of the necessary information than many other African countries, but we still have large gaps. Much of the focus on filling these gaps is through the much-needed, more ambient air pollution data. My group uses big data from satellite instruments and atmospheric models to work to fill these gaps – often integrating different information streams. This requires large computational resources as well as skills in analysis of such large data sets.’

Highly collaborative

With an impressive record of work undertaken internationally, as well as leadership roles in numerous major research projects and a long list of publications as lead author, Prof Garland can speak with clear authority about the work done in her field in a multidisciplinary manner: ‘My group works with multiple research infrastructures in South Africa, specifically NITheCS, the Expanded Freshwater and Terrestrial Environmental Observation Network (EFTEON) and the Biogeochemistry Research Infrastructure Platform (BIOGRIP). They are all very different, but one key aspect that I think is invaluable is the ability of these infrastructures to bring together the diverse communities from different domains to answer cross-cutting and transdisciplinary problems. The work we do is highly collaborative across expertise and disciplines. Although my group focuses on understanding the atmospheric aspect of a question, it also collaborates, for example, with health researchers to understand the health impacts, as well as with ecologists and soil scientists to understand the impacts of pollution on the environment.’

She continues: ‘As a NITheCS Branch Head, I hope to facilitate such community building within the UP NITheCS community, and support the linkages of NITheCS to the air quality and atmospheric science community.’

Prof Garland says another interesting area of collaboration has started in the area of environmental justice: ‘Often the poorer and more vulnerable communities are exposed to higher levels of pollution; starting to address such a challenge requires a collaborative team from the social as well as natural sciences.’

From Ontario to Pretoria

Prof Garland, who grew up in Ontario, New York (USA) has over 20 years of experience in her field of atmospheric composition and air quality: its linkages to climate change, and their impacts.

She went to Allegheny College, Meadville, Pennsylvania, where she received her BSc in Environmental Chemistry cum laude. She then became a US Peace Corps high school chemistry teacher for two years in Lwandai Secondary School in Mlalo, Tanzania, before going to graduate school at the University of Colorado, Boulder, where she worked on aerosol particle research with Professor Margaret Tolbert and was awarded her PhD in chemistry.

Prof Garland elaborates further: ‘During my PhD, I also worked with Prof AR Ravishankara at NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration). I then moved to the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry in Mainz, Germany, for my postdoctoral fellowship, where I focused on the optical properties of aerosols working with Dr. Ulrich Pöschl. Among others I led field and laboratory measurements of optical and biological properties of aerosol particles utilising a variety of instrumentation and began the development of a master mechanism of aerosol particle and cloud chemistry as part of the European Commission-funded European Integrated Project on Aerosol Cloud Climate Air Quality Interactions (EUCARRI) project.’

‘I was then an American Association for the Advancement of Science and Technology (AAAS) Policy Fellow in the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) in the Department of Energy in Washington, DC. My principal responsibilities included providing cross-cutting analysis for senior management of the Department of Energy and EERE technology programme offices, being a point of contact for the integrated deployment team that led the deployment of clean energy technologies, policy and financing structures, and support for all EERE Recovery Act projects.’

After that, she moved to South Africa and started working at CSIR on air quality and climate issues in southern Africa, ‘where my principal responsibilities included leading the research programmes on characterising air pollution and the impacts of air pollution, and the impact of climate change on human health. I was also responsible for skill development of junior researchers and students.’

Having also served as Extraordinary Associate Professor at North-West University Unit for Environmental Sciences and Management, Potchefstroom until 2021, she moved to UP in 2022 as an Associate Professor, and was promoted to full Professor in 2025.

In addition to the duties of being a convener for multiple international conferences, and supervising Masters and PhD candidates, Prof Garland has been the external examiner for eight Masters and ten PhD theses (in South Africa and internationally). Among her many other responsibilities as academic leader, she has also served on two PhD advisory committees for Laboratoire Interuniversitaire des Systèmes Atmosphériques, Université Paris Est Créteil, France.

One of the indicators of the practical importance of the work done by researchers such as Prof Garland is clear: many of the projects in which she has participated and was often the principal investigator, have resulted in multiple technical reports that ‘range from technical to high-level summary reports for clients, who are often decision-makers’. And importantly, decision-makers rely on the well-researched data of scientists world-wide.