Prof Moira Jardine

Professor

Email: mmj@st-andrews.ac.uk

Teaching

I have taught students at all levels, from first year undergraduates to post-graduates. I currently teach 3 courses:

Subhonours:

AS1001 - the Solar System component

Honours:

PH4031: Fluids
AS5002: Magnetofluids and space Plasmas

I also contribute towards the SUPA graduate school course on Astrophysical Plasmas.

Other teaching-related activity:

I coordinate the astronomy first year modules and tutor the "Transferable Skills" module (PH3014).

Research areas

I am a professor of Astronomy at the University of St Andrews. I was appointed to a personal chair in 2010 when I became the first female professor of physics at this University. The aim of my research is to understand the evolutionary history of our own solar system and the fundamental physics that governs planet habitability. To achieve this, I study the magnetic activity of a range of stars. This activity drives both the stellar wind and the coronal X-ray emission that can erode and irradiate planetary atmospheres. This has a long-term impact on the ability of the planet to harbour complex life.

Magnetic activity is also a major barrier to exoplanet detection, so this work is of strategic importance for future exoplanet studies with NIR instruments such as SPIROU and CARMENES and also for missions such as MEarth, JWST, EChO, GAIA and WFIRST. In the longer term, it also underpins all astrobiology initiatives aimed at understanding the development of life, since planets and their host stars are interdependent and so their evolution must be considered together.

Although I am primarily a theorist, my work involves a very integral relationship with large international observing teams. I mainly achieve this through several consortia: MagIcS (PI: Donati - includes over 100 scientists from over 10 countries) and Bcool (PI Petit - a large-scale survey of the magnetic activity of solar-like stars).

Selected publications

Open access
Electron cyclotron maser emission from ejected stellar prominences on V374 Peg
Brasseur, C. E., Jardine, M. M., Daley-Yates, S., Donati, J. F. & Morin, J., 1 Mar 2026, In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 546, 3, 12 p., stag042.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access
WASP-12, shrouded in mystery or just cold gas?
Daley-Yates, S., Beckmann, R. S., McCallum, L., Jardine, M. M. & Cameron, A. C., 1 Jan 2026, In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 545, 3, 11 p., staf2201.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access
A magnetic field study of two fast-rotating, radio-bright M dwarfs
Bellotti, S., Cristofari, P. I., Callingham, J. R., Morin, J., Petit, P., Vidotto, A. A., Jardine, M., Arnold, L., Kavanagh, R. D., LLama, J. & Vedantham, H., 17 Dec 2025, In: Astronomy & Astrophysics. 704, A298.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access
A plasma torus around a young low-mass star
Bouma, L. G. & Jardine, M. M., 20 Jul 2025, In: The Astrophysical Journal Letters. 988, L3.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access
Corotating interaction regions (CIRs): impacts with exoplanets
Waugh, R. F. P. & Jardine, M. M., 5 Aug 2025, In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 541, 4, p. 3739-3747 9 p.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access
The magnetic and spin-down properties of slowly rotating fully convective M dwarfs
See, V., Amard, L., Bellotti, S., Boro Saikia, S., Brown, E. L., Donati, J.-F., Fares, R., Finley, A. J., Folsom, C. P., Hébrard, É. M., Jardine, M. M., Jeffers, S. V., Klein, B., Lehmann, L. T., Marsden, S. C., Matt, S. P., Mengel, M. W., Morin, J., Petit, P. & Smith, K. & 2 others, Vidotto, A. A. & Waite, I. A., 1 Sept 2025, In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 542, 2, p. 1318-1330
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access
Constraining the coronal properties of AB Dor in the radio regime
Brasseur, C. E., Jardine, M. M. & Hussain, G. A. J., May 2024, In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 530, 2, p. 2442-2451 10 p.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access
Simulating stellar coronal rain and slingshot prominences
Daley-Yates, S. & Jardine, M. M., Oct 2024, In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 534, 1, p. 621–633
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access
Can scallop-shell stars trap dust in their magnetic fields?
Sanderson, H., Jardine, M., Cameron, A. C., Morin, J. & Donati, J.-F., 1 Jan 2023, In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 518, 3, p. 4734–4745 12 p., stac3302.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access
Heating and cooling in stellar coronae: coronal rain on a young Sun
Daley-Yates, S., Jardine, M. M. & Johnston, C. D., Dec 2023, In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 526, 2, p. 1646-1656 11 p.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

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