Staff profile

• 2019 - present: Assistant Professor, Department of Geography, Durham University
• 2018 - 2019: GeoX Fellow, Institute of Earth and Environmental Science, University of Potsdam. Fusion of high-resolution point cloud and spectral data for deriving topographic metrics.
• 2017: Predoctoral Research Associate, St. Anthony Falls Laboratory, University of Minnesota. Climate change and fluvial systems: investigating the impact of channel geometry on landscape evolution.
• 2016-2017: NERC Knowledge Exchange Fellow, University of Edinburgh. Modelling the impact of future climate change on flood risk in Scotland.
• 2013-2017: PhD, University of Edinburgh. Controls on fluvial networks in upland landscapes: from hillslopes to floodplains.
• 2009-2013: BSc Geology and Physical Geography, University of Edinburgh. First Class Honours.

Research Interests

I am a geomorphologist studying the interactions between the shape of Earth’s topography, surface processes, tectonics, and climate. There are two main strands to my research: 

1.     Development of new computational techniques and methods: to improve our ability to quantify the shape of the Earth’s surface and extract geomorphic metrics. A large part of my research is developing open-source software for analysing topographic data. I particularly focus on dealing with high-resolution data derived from lidar point clouds. I’ve been developing this software, called LSDTopoTools, along with colleagues at the University of Edinburgh, University of Glasgow, and Queen Mary University of London. See our LSDTopoTools website for more details, or check out our GitHub organisation. We have developed lots of novel techniques for analysing topography, such as extracting channel networks, delineating floodplains and river terraces, and calculating hilltop and hillslope metrics.

2.     Applying these techniques to investigate the impact of climate and tectonics on Earth surface processes. I am particularly interested in i) how the signature of seismic-cycle uplift and strain are recorded in Earth's landscapes; and ii) what drives valley widening and lateral channel mobility in mountain systems. I have ongoing work focusing in regions such as the Nepal Himalaya, the Oregon Coast Range, the western Andes, and the Southern Alps of New Zealand.

Esteem Indicators

2024 European Geosciences Union Outstanding Early Career Scientist Award, Geomorphology Division.

Chapter in book

• Mudd, S. M., Roda-Boluda, D. C., Goren, L., & Clubb, F. J. (2021). Beyond the Long Profile. In Reference Module in Earth Systems and Environmental Sciences. Elsevier. https://doi.org/10.1016/b978-0-12-818234-5.00026-2
• Grieve, S. W., Clubb, F. J., & Mudd, S. M. (2020). Reproducible topographic analysis. In P. Tarolli, & S. M. Mudd (Eds.), Remote sensing of geomorphology (339-367). Elsevier. https://doi.org/10.1016/b978-0-444-64177-9.00012-6

Journal Article

• Clubb, F. J., Mudd, S. M., Schildgen, T. F., van der Beek, P. A., Devrani, R., & Sinclair, H. D. (2023). Himalayan valley-floor widths controlled by tectonically-driven exhumation. Nature Geoscience, 16, 739–746. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-023-01238-8
• Zondervan, J. R., Hilton, R. G., Dellinger, M., Clubb, F. J., Roylands, T., & Ogrič, M. (2023). Rock organic carbon oxidation CO2 release offsets silicate weathering sink. Nature, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-023-06581-9
• Jamieson, S. S. R., Ross, N., Paxman, G. J. G., Clubb, F. J., Young, D. A., Yan, S., …Siegert, M. J. (2023). An ancient river landscape preserved beneath the East Antarctic Ice Sheet. Nature Communications, 14(1), Article 6507. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-42152-2
• Clubb, F. J., Weir, E. F., & Mudd, S. M. (2022). Continuous measurements of valley floor width in mountainous landscapes. Earth Surface Dynamics, 10(3), 437-456. https://doi.org/10.5194/esurf-10-437-2022
• Gailleton, B., Mudd, S. M., Clubb, F. J., Grieve, S. W., & Hurst, M. D. (2021). Impact of changing concavity indices on channel steepness and divide migration metrics. Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface, 126(10), Article e2020JF006060. https://doi.org/10.1029/2020jf006060
• Clubb, F., Mudd, S., Hurst, M., & Grieve, S. (2020). Differences in channel and hillslope geometry record a migrating uplift wave at the Mendocino Triple Junction. Geology, 48(2), 184-188. https://doi.org/10.1130/g46939.1
• Hurst, M. D., Grieve, S. W., Clubb, F. J., & Mudd, S. M. (2019). Detection of channel-hillslope coupling along a tectonic gradient. Earth and Planetary Science Letters, 522, 30-39. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.epsl.2019.06.018
• Clubb, F. J., Bookhagen, B., & Rheinwalt, A. (2019). Clustering River Profiles to Classify Geomorphic Domains. Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface, 124(6), 1417-1439. https://doi.org/10.1029/2019jf005025
• Gailleton, B., Mudd, S. M., Clubb, F. J., Peifer, D., & Hurst, M. D. (2019). A segmentation approach for the reproducible extraction and quantification of knickpoints from river long profiles. Earth Surface Dynamics, 7(1), 211-230. https://doi.org/10.5194/esurf-7-211-2019
• Goodwin, G. C., Mudd, S. M., & Clubb, F. J. (2018). Unsupervised detection of salt marsh platforms: a topographic method. Earth Surface Dynamics, 6(1), 239-255. https://doi.org/10.5194/esurf-6-239-2018
• Mudd, S. M., Clubb, F. J., Gailleton, B., & Hurst, M. D. (2018). How concave are river channels?. Earth Surface Dynamics, 6(2), 505-523. https://doi.org/10.5194/esurf-6-505-2018
• Grieve, S. W., Hales, T. C., Parker, R. N., Mudd, S. M., & Clubb, F. J. (2018). Controls on Zero‐Order Basin Morphology. Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface, https://doi.org/10.1029/2017jf004453
• Clubb, F. J., Mudd, S. M., Milodowski, D. T., Valters, D. A., Slater, L. J., Hurst, M. D., & Limaye, A. B. (2017). Geomorphometric delineation of floodplains and terraces from objectively defined topographic thresholds. Earth Surface Dynamics Discussions, 5, 369-385. https://doi.org/10.5194/esurf-2017-21
• Clubb, F. J., Mudd, S. M., Attal, M., Milodowski, D. T., & Grieve, S. W. (2016). The relationship between drainage density, erosion rate, and hilltop curvature: Implications for sediment transport processes. Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface, 121(10), 1724-1745. https://doi.org/10.1002/2015jf003747
• Grieve, S. W., Mudd, S. M., Milodowski, D. T., Clubb, F. J., & Furbish, D. J. (2016). How does grid-resolution modulate the topographic expression of geomorphic processes?. Earth Surface Dynamics, 4(3), 627-653. https://doi.org/10.5194/esurf-4-627-2016
• Clubb, F. J., Mudd, S. M., Milodowski, D. T., Hurst, M. D., & Slater, L. J. (2014). Objective extraction of channel heads from high-resolution topographic data. Water Resources Research, 50(5), 4283-4304. https://doi.org/10.1002/2013wr015167