Rob King
Rob manages the Facilities group which designs, builds and provides technical support for Met Office instrumentation on the FAAM 146 research aircraft.
Areas of expertise
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Aircraft Instrumentation
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Electronics
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PCB Design
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Mechanical Engineering
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Vacuum Systems
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Cryogenics
Current activities
Rob manages the team which is currently involved in the design, development, and manufacture of a new aerosol instrument (EXSCALABAR), and Ice Nucleus Counter (INC) as well as the on-going development of ISMAR.
The Facilities Group of Observation Based Research has responsibility for all the Met Office instrumentation used on board the FAAM BAe146-301 aircraft, which the Met Office uses for its atmospheric studies. This list includes instruments such as the Shortwave Spectrometer (SWS), Spectral Hemispheric Irradiance Measurements (SHIMs), Imaging Infra-Red Cameras (IIR), LiDAR and the large radiometers ISMAR, MARSS, DEIMOS and ARIES. The group also assists FAAM in the support of the core suite of instrumentation fitted to the aircraft.
Rob also sits on the various FAAM Instrument working groups as well as the FAAM aircraft engineering committee.
Career background
Rob's career started as a research technician at the University of Exeter Department of Physics, specialising in low temperature semiconductors but with a broad remit covering various Physics and Engineering-based projects. Subsequent to this, Rob entered the semiconductor industry, working with semiconductor lasers and sputtering equipment. He is a qualified Service Engineer of CPI sputtering power supplies.
Rob joined the Met Office in March 2007.