SOLACE: Sustainable Organic and Inorganic Laboratory Aerosols for Climate Engineering

The SOLACE project (Sustainable Organic and Inorganic Laboratory Aerosols for Climate Engineering) will investigate the impacts of using engineered aerosols for solar radiation management. Led by an interdisciplinary team at the University of British Columbia, the project will examine whether solid inorganic particles proposed for stratospheric aerosol injection could unintentionally trigger ozone-depleting polar stratospheric clouds, and whether engineered organic particles — derived from waste biopolymers and ice-nucleating proteins — can efficiently and safely thin cirrus and Arctic clouds. Through laboratory experiments, atmospheric simulations, and molecular dynamics modeling, SOLACE aims to identify the most promising aerosol candidates for climate engineering while training a new generation of researchers.

Allan Bertram is a professor of chemistry and distinguished university scholar at the University of British Columbia. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Waterloo and completed postdoctoral research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His research focuses on the chemical and physical properties of atmospheric aerosols and their influence on air quality, atmospheric chemistry, and climate. Current projects explore the properties of wildfire smoke and microplastics, and how these particles affect the atmosphere and environment.

W. Russ Algar is a professor at the University of British Columbia with expertise in bioanalytical and materials chemistry. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Toronto in 2010 and did postdoctoral research at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory’s Center for Biomolecular Science and Engineering. His research interests include the development, characterization, and applications of colloidal nanoparticles, and he has extensive experience in designing functional surface chemistries for these materials. Algar’s work has been recognized with a Sloan Fellowship, the McBryde Medal from the Canada Society for Chemistry, and other awards.

Nadine Borduas-Dedekind is an atmospheric chemist with a B.Sc. and M.Sc. in organic chemistry. She completed her Ph.D. in 2015 at the University of Toronto, funded by a prestigious Vanier scholarship on the chemical mechanisms of amine pollutants in the atmosphere. She worked as an air quality consultant in South Africa before pursuing an NSERC postdoctoral fellowship at ETH Zurich in Switzerland. In 2018, she was awarded an SNSF Ambizione grant to start her independent career at ETH. In 2021, she moved her group to the University of British Columbia where she has raised over $4M in funding for her research program centered on understanding the fate of large organic molecules in the atmosphere applied to atmospheric ice nucleation, biogeochemistry, and air quality.

Grenfell N. Patey is a chemistry professor at the University of British Columbia. He obtained his Ph.D. from the University of Toronto in theoretical/computational chemistry. His research interests lie in the statistical mechanical theory and computational modeling of complex physical systems and processes. Current research activities include the application of molecular dynamics and machine learning methods to unravel the microscopic mechanisms of homogeneous and heterogeneous crystal nucleation. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.