EC member and national contact, IAPSO;

Member and national contact, BRICS WG on ocean and polar research;

Lead author, Working Group 2, IPCC Assessment Report 5 (2011-2013);

Member of editorial board, Oceanology journal;

Member of editorial board, Oceanological Research journal;

Member of editorial board, Water Resources journal;

Member of editorial board, Fundamental and Applied Hydrophysics journal;

Member of editorial board, Geosystems of Transition Zones journal.

I am a physical oceanographer with background in general physics. At the early stages of my career, at the State Oceanographic Institute, Russia, and, subsequently, Oregon State University, USA, my research mainly focused on small-scale processes and mixing in the upper layer of the ocean. Later, during my 5-years long work at the University of Rio Grande, Brazil, I shifted towards observational regional oceanography of the Southwestern Atlantic ocean, comprising the Brazil-Malvinas Confluence region and the adjacent shelf areas. At that time, I also started to focus on continental freshwater discharges into the ocean, and their impacts on coastal circulations. My results of that period were associated with the assessment of the impacts of freshwater runoff into the ocean from the La Plata Estuary and the Patos lagoon. After returning to Russia and accepting a position at  the Shirshov Institute of Oceanology, my interests drifted further towards coastal oceanography, as well as marginal and inland seas, and terrestrial water bodies. In particular, I have gathered considerable experience in field work in the northeastern shelf of the Black Sea, focusing on anthropogenic pollution of the coastal zone, and interactions between the local river discharges and mesoscale shelf circulations. Further, since 2002, I have led a research programme dedicated to the Aral Sea, a major salty lake in the Central Asia, presently undergoing severe desiccation and salinization attributed to anthropogenic diversions of water from tributary rivers, as well as the climate change effects. This research programme, which included 21 field surveys of the lake accomplished to date, helped to reveal the present physical regime of the water body, assess details of its water budget, and formulate some predictions for the future. My secondary lines of research also comprise new methods of remote sensing of the coastal zone, and groundwater – sea water interactions. The geographic areas of my interest and some expertise include, in addition to those mentioned above, the South China Sea  and the Taiwan Strait, the Kara Sea, the Caspian Sea, and Lake Issyk Kul.