Professor Dame Jane Francis

Jane Francis is Director of the British Antarctic Survey. She is involved with international polar organisations, such as the Antarctic Treaty and European Polar Board, and is on several advisory boards of national polar programmes.
Jane Francis is a geologist by training, with research interests in past climate change. She has undertaken research projects at the universities of Southampton, London, Leeds and Adelaide, using fossils and sediments to determine the change from greenhouse to icehouse climates in the polar regions over the past 100 million years. She has undertaken over 15 scientific expeditions to the Arctic and Antarctica in search of fossil forests and information about climates of the past.
Dame Professor Francis was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George (DCMG) in recognition of services to UK polar science and diplomacy. She was also awarded the UK Polar Medal by H.M The Queen, the Royal Geographical Society’s Patrons Medal and the 2022 Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation Award for Planetary Health. Dame Professor Francis is Chancellor of the University of Leeds, a Fellow of the Royal Society, and President of the Royal Geographical Society.