It is with deep sadness that we announce the passing of friend, colleague, and mentor Professor Joanna Elizabeth Bullard, an esteemed scholar of Physical Geography at Loughborough University, who died peacefully on 27 October 2025 at the age of 56 after a short illness.
Jo’s academic journey began at the University of Edinburgh, where she studied Geography from 1987 to 1991. She then completed her PhD at the University of Sheffield on the morphological variation of linear sand dunes in the southwest Kalahari, earning her doctorate in 1994. After an initial lectureship at Keele University, Jo joined Loughborough University in 1998, where she later earned Chair in 2011. She also served as an Adjunct Professor in Atmospheric Research at Griffith University in Australia from 2004 to 2016.
Throughout her career, Jo made pioneering contributions to geomorphology and helped shape scientific understanding of wind as a geomorphic force. Her fieldwork took her to environments ranging from hot deserts to cold, dust-producing landscapes, complemented by innovative laboratory, modelling and remote-sensing approaches. Early studies of desert dune systems in the Kalahari, Namib and Simpson deserts offered crucial insights into how dunes respond to climate variability.
In 2005, Jo began work that would define much of her later career: the study of dust. Her research on high-latitude dust dynamics, including fieldwork in Greenland and Iceland, transformed global understanding of cold-climate dust sources. Her 2016 article “High-latitude dust in the Earth system” became her most cited publication, and she played a central role in building the High Latitude Dust research network. More recently, she was a trailblazer in examining how wind transports and abrades microplastics, publishing influential work that rapidly shaped an emerging field. Jo’s excellence was recognised with numerous prestigious awards, including the British Society for Geomorphology’s Gordon Warwick Award and later Fellowship of that society, the Philip Leverhulme Prize, and the Ralph Alger Bagnold Medal of the EGU.
Beyond her research, Jo was an exceptional academic leader and advocate for geography. She served in major roles within the International Society of Aeolian Research, the British Society for Geomorphology, and the Royal Geographical Society. At Loughborough, she made transformative contributions to teaching, notably guiding the transition to online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic, and was honoured with multiple institutional awards including Loughborough’s most prestigious accolade, its University Medal.
Jo was a dedicated mentor whose generosity, passion, humour and camaraderie shaped the careers of countless students and colleagues. Her sudden passing has left a profound void in the global aeolian geomorphology community. She will be deeply missed, and her legacy will endure through the many people she inspired and the science she championed.
A complete obituary has been published by the RGS here: https://www.geomorphology.org.uk/2025/11/14/professor-joanna-bullard-1969-2025/
There will be a Celebration of Jo’s Life at Loughborough University on Thursday 4 December 2025, 2.30pm.
To allow the organisers to cater for everyone, please complete this short online form by 26 November if you would like to attend.