Professor Steve Sparks

NERC Research Professor

Department of Earth Sciences
University of Bristol
Wills Memorial Building
Queens Road, Bristol
BS8 1RJ, UK

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Research Expertise

Professor Sparks leads the VOGRIPA project to create a database of volcanic hazard and risk under the as part of the Global Risk Identification Project under the auspices of the UN and World Bank. Steve Sparks's specialist areas of research are in volcanology and in the applications of fluid dynamics to geological problems. He is foremost a geologist with broad scientific interests. His research involves observation, experiment and theory. Steve Sparks has nearly 30 years of experience of working on active and young volcanoes around the world and has been concentrating in the last several years on the eruption of the Soufriere Hills Volcano on Montserrat where concerns relating to health hazards of fine-grained volcanic ash have been prominent. With regard to the health hazards at volcanoes, he has worked extensively on the basic physical processes that govern the characteristics of volcanic ash and gas and that control their dispersal in the atmosphere. Steve Sparks was P.I. on the Leverhulme Trust Research Interchange Grant which supported the foundation of IVHHN.

Relevant Publications

Hincks, T.K., Aspinall, W.P., Baxter, P.J., Searl, A., Sparks, R.S.J. and Woo, G. 2006 Long-term exposure to respirable volcanic ash on Montserrat: a time series simulation. Bulletin of Volcanology 68, 266-284.

Horwell, C.J., Fenoglio, I., Ragnarsdottir, K.V., Sparks, R.S.J., and Fubini, B. 2003. Surface reactivity of volcanic ash from the eruption of Soufrière Hills volcano, Montserrat, with implications for health hazards. Environ. Res., 93, 202-215.

Horwell, C.J., Sparks, R.S.J., Brewer, T.S., Llewellin, E.W., and Williamson, B.J. 2003. The characterisation of respirable volcanic ash from the Soufriere Hills Volcano, Montserrat, with implications for health hazard. Bull. Volcanol., 65, 346-362.

Sparks, R.S.J., Barclay, J., Calder, E.S., Herd, R.A., Luckett, R. Norton, G.E, Ritchie, L.J., Voight, B. and Woods A.W. 2002. Generation of a debris avalanche and violent pyroclastic density current: the 26 December 1997 (Boxing Day) at Soufrière Hills Volcano, Montserrat. In: Druitt, T.H. and Kokelaar, B.P. (eds) The eruption of the Soufrière Hills Volcano, Montserrat 1995 to 1999. Geological Society, London. Memoir 21, 409-434.

Bonadonna, C., Mayberry, G.C., Calder, E.S., Sparks, R.S.J., Choux, C., Jackson, P., Lejeune, A.M., Loughlin, S.C., Norton, G.E., Rose, W.I., Ryan, G. and Young, S.R. 2002. Tephra fallout in the eruption of Soufrière Hills Volcano, Montserrat. In: Druitt, T.H. and Kokelaar, B.P. (eds) The eruption of the Soufrière Hills Volcano, Montserrat 1995 to 1999. Geological Society, London. Memoir 21.

Horwell, C.J., Braña, L.P., Sparks, R.S.J., Murphy, M.D., and Hards, V.L. 2001. A geochemical investigation of fragmentation and physical fractionation in pyroclastic flows from the Soufriere Hills volcano, Montserrat. J. Volcanol. Geotherm. Res., 109, 247-262.

Sparks, R.S.J. & Young, S.R. 2001. The eruption of Soufrière Hills Volcano, Montserrat: overview of scientific results. In: Druitt, T.H. & Kokelaar, B.P. (eds) The eruption of Soufrière Hills Volcano, Montserrat, from 1995 to 1999. Geological Society, London, Memoir 21, 45-69.

Sparks, R.S.J., Murphy, M.D., Lejeune, A.M., Watts, R.B., Barclay, J. and Young, S.R. 2000. Control on the emplacement of the andesite lava dome of the Soufrière Hills Volcano by degassing-induced crystallization. Terra Nova, 12, 14-20.

Baxter, P.J., Bonadonna, C., Dupree, R., Hards, V.L., Kohn, S.C., Murphy, M.D., Nichols, A., Nicholson, R.A., Norton, G., Searl, A., Sparks, R.S.J. and Vickers, B.P. 1999. Cristobalite in volcanic ash of the Soufrière Hills Volcano, Montserrat: Hazards implications. Science 283, 1142-1145.

Day M.J., Pearson G.R., Lucke V.M., Lane S.J. and Sparks R.S.J. 1996. The pathology of mineral deposition in the lymph node and lung of the dog, Veterinary Pathology 33, 29-42.