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PhD(Dund), MSc(Napier), BSc(Hons)(Swansea)

Tel: 03 479 5249
Location: Science II, 1n8d
Email: cliff.law@niwa.co.nz

Professor Cliff Law's expertise is in marine biogeochemistry, with a focus on marine trace gases, phytoplankton growth controls, ocean acidification and climate change. He currently leads a MBIE project, CARIM (Coastal Acidification: Rate, Impacts and Management), and a Sustainable Seas Innovation Fund project on mitigating coastal acidification around mussel farms. He has published 100 papers, with recognition via the Prime Ministers Science Team award (2011), the Institute of Chemical Engineers Hutchinson medal (2013), and the University of Otago Science Division Research Group of the Year award (2015). He has coordinated international and national research activities, as a member of the IGBP SOLAS (Surface Ocean Lower Atmosphere Study) steering committee and as co-director of the NIWA-University of Otago Centre for Oceanography (http://www.otago.ac.nz/oceanography/index.html ). He is also a member of the University of Otago Ocean Acidification Theme steering committee and the Marsden ESA Review Panel.

Professor Law teaches undergraduate courses on marine chemistry for the Departments of Chemistry, Marine Sciences and Botany. He also works for the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research in Wellington, where he leads the Oceans-Climate Interactions program (https://www.niwa.co.nz/people/cliff-law).

Publications

Law, C. S., Barr, N., Currie, K., Deppeler, S., Dillingham, P. W., Gall, M. P., … Murdoch, J., … Safi, K. (2026). Coastal phytoplankton response to acidification and warming under differing levels of nutrient availability. Microorganisms, 14, 989. doi: 10.3390/microorganisms14050989 Journal - Research Article

Hoffmann, L. J., Bach, L. T., Bauer, K. W., Cross, J., Ghosh, A., Hernández-Ayón, J. M., … Law, C. S., … Zitoun, R. (2026). Monitoring, reporting, and verification of marine carbon dioxide removal: Exploring scientific consensus and divergences across continents. Elementa, 14(1), 00113. doi: 10.1525/elementa.2025.00113 Journal - Research Article

Rickard, G. J., Law, C. S., & Pinkerton, M. H. (2026). Climate change projections for the southwest Pacific Ocean using coupled model intercomparison project (CMIP) phase 5 and 6 models: Implications for physics, biogeochemistry, ecosystems, and fisheries. Marine & Freshwater Research, 60, e70002. doi: 10.1002/nzm2.70002 Journal - Research Article

van de Velde, S. J., Vervoort, P., Smith, R. O., Law, C. S., & Currie, K. (2026). Anthropogenically stimulated carbonate dissolution in the global shelf seafloor is potentially an important and fast climate feedback. AGU Advances, 7(1), e2025AV001865. doi: 10.1029/2025AV001865 Journal - Research Article

Seabrook, S., Law, C. S., Thurber, A. R., Ladroit, Y., Cummings, V., Tait, L., … Hawes, I. (2025). Antarctic seep emergence and discovery in the shallow coastal environment. Nature Communications, 16, 8740. doi: 10.1038/s41467-025-63404-3 Journal - Research Article

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