Biography

❄️ I am currently a postdoctoral researcher at the Takuvik Joint International Laboratory (Université Laval & CNRS-INSU; Quebec City, Canada), working with Florent Dominé to improve the representation of Arctic snowpacks in physically based snow models.

🌐 Previously, I led an ESA CCI postdoc fellowship at UQTR (Trois-Rivières, Canada) within the SnowC2 project, which aimed to improve the snow scheme of the CLASSIC LSM in Arctic regions, in collaboration with Environment and Climate Change Canada.

🏔️ I obtained my PhD at IGE (Grenoble, France), under the supervision of Martin Ménégoz and Gerhard Krinner, where I investigated climate trends and variability in High Mountain Asia using CMIP6 multi-model analyses and developments in the ORCHIDEE LSM.

Interests

  • Snow
  • Models
  • Mountain Areas
  • Arctic
  • General Circulation Models
  • CMIP6
  • Parameterizations
  • Deep Learning

Education

  • Postdoctoral Researcher, 2026-2027

    Takuvik Joint International Laboratory (Université Laval & CNRS-INSU; Quebec City, Canada)

  • ESA CCI Postdoc Fellowship, 2023-2025

    UQTR / RIVE / GLACIOLAB (Trois-Rivières, Canada)

  • PhD in Earth and Environmental Sciences, 2019-2022

    Institute of Environmental Geosciences (Grenoble, France)

  • MSc in Atmosphere, Climate, and Continental Surfaces, 2019

    Université Grenoble Alpes (Grenoble, France)

Skills

Programming

Python · Fortran

Climate & Snow Models

CLASSIC · ORCHIDEE · LMDZ

Linux & HPC

IDRIS · TGCC

Development Tools

VS Code · JupyterLab

Version Control

GitHub · GitLab

AI-Assisted Coding

Copilot · Codex

Featured Publications

Improving the CLASSIC (v1.8) snow model to better simulate Arctic snowpacks

This study enhances a snow model for Arctic environments by improving the heat exchanges within the snowpack and at its interfaces, revising the compaction scheme, and adding consideration of blowing snow sublimation losses. Simulations at ten Arctic, mid-latitude, and Alpine sites show significant reductions in simulated soil and snow temperature biases and improved simulated snow depth and density, which are key features to improve simulated energy, water, and carbon budgets in the Arctic.
Mickaël Lalande, Alexandre Roy, Libo Wang, Diana Verseghy, Vincent Vionnet, Florent Dominé, Christophe Kinnard
PDF Code Project DOI

Improving climate model skill over High Mountain Asia by adapting snow cover parameterization to complex-topography areas

This study investigates the impact of topography on snow cover parameterizations using models and observations. Parameterizations without topography-based considerations overestimate snow cover. Incorporating topography reduces snow overestimation by 5–10 % in mountains, in turn reducing cold biases. However, some biases remain, requiring further calibration and more data. Assessing snow cover parameterizations is challenging due to limited and uncertain data in mountainous regions.
Mickaël Lalande, Martin Ménégoz, Gerhard Krinner, Catherine Ottlé, Frédérique Cheruy
PDF Code Project DOI

Climate change in the High Mountain Asia in CMIP6

Climate change over High Mountain Asia is investigated with CMIP6 climate models. A general cold bias is found in this area, often related to a snow cover overestimation in the models. Ensemble experiments generally encompass the past observed trends, suggesting that even biased models can reproduce the trends. Depending on the future scenario, a warming from 1.9 to 6.5 °C, associated with a snow cover decrease and precipitation increase, is expected at the end of the 21st century.
Mickaël Lalande, Martin Ménégoz, Gerhard Krinner, Kathrin Naegeli, Stefan Wunderle
PDF Code Project DOI
See all publications

Recent Posts

Modéliser la neige en Himalaya - Mickaël Lalande || T'fais une thèse ?

Mickaël Lalande est doctorant en géosciences à l’Université Grenoble Alpes. Il travaille sur la modélisation climatique. Cela ne vous dit rien ? Il s’agit de diviser la planète en cubes et de calculer les variables climatiques pour faire des projections, facile !
Last updated on Jan 6, 2023 1 min read Video

Réchauffement exacerbé dans les Hautes Montagnes d’Asie

Suite à la sortie de mon premier article scientifique sur le changement climatique en Himalaya et sur le Plateau Tibétain (en utilisant la dernière génération de modèles CMIP6), voici un résumé grand public publié par mon laboratoire : https://www.
Last updated on Jan 6, 2023 1 min read Article

FLASH | Le réchauffement climatique en cours est-il dû à l'Homme ?

La réponse en moins de 2 min avec Mickaël Lalande, doctorant à l’Institut des Géosciences de l’Environnement
Last updated on Jan 6, 2023 2 min read Video
See all posts

Projects

SnowC2 (2023-2025)

Snow cover heterogeneity and its impact on the Climate and Carbon cycle of Arctic regions

PhD (2019-2022)

Modeling climate trends and variability in High Mountain Asia to understand cryosphere changes

Science et Climat

Chaine YouTube de vulgarisation autour de la science et du climat !

Medias

Compiles all media content.

Tutorials

Some tutorials about random stuff.

Upcoming Talks

Featured Talks

EGU25: Improving the CLASSIC Snow Model to Better Simulate Arctic Snowpacks

https://meetingorganizer.copernicus.org/EGU25/EGU25-45.html
May 2, 2025 11:40 AM — 11:50 AM Austria Center Vienna — Room L1
Mickaël Lalande, Christophe Kinnard, Alexandre Roy
Code Project Slides

PhD defense: Modeling climate trends and variability in High Mountain Asia to understand cryosphere changes

The High Mountain Asia (HMA) is hosting the largest ice stock after the polar regions. This resource provides a freshwater supply to …
Feb 28, 2023 2:00 PM — 5:00 PM Institut des Géosciences de l'Environnement - Salle Lliboutry
PDF Code Project Slides Video
See all talks

Experience

 
 
 
 
 

Postdoctoral Researcher

Takuvik Joint International Laboratory (Université Laval & CNRS-INSU)

Mar 2026 – Feb 2027 Québec, Canada

Improving the representation of Arctic snowpacks in physically based snow models supervised by Florent Dominé

Snow Model Development - Observations - Arctic regions

 
 
 
 
 

ESA CCI Postdoc Fellowship

UQTR / RIVE / GLACIOLAB

Oct 2023 – Oct 2025 Trois-Rivières, Canada

Snow cover heterogeneity and its impact on the Climate and Carbon cycle of Arctic regions (SnowC2) supervised by Christophe Kinnard

Snow Model Development - CLASSIC - Arctic regions

Project

 
 
 
 
 

PhD Student

Institute of Environmental Geosciences

Oct 2019 – Dec 2022 Grenoble, France

Modeling climate trends and variability in High Mountain Asia to understand cryosphere changes supervised by Martin Ménégoz and Gerhard Krinner

High Mountain Asia - General Circulation Models - CMIP6 - Snow Cover - Parameterizations

Project | Code

 
 
 
 
 

MSc Research Intern

Institute of Environmental Geosciences

Feb 2019 – Jul 2019 Grenoble, France

Identification and filtering of oceanic chaos by Machine Learning supervised by Thierry Penduff and Redouane Lguensat

Oceanography - Chaos - Deep Learning - Spatial Altimetry

Report | Code

 
 
 
 
 

MSc Research Intern

Institute of Environmental Geosciences

Apr 2018 – Jul 2018 Grenoble, France

The impact of Arctic sea ice variability on the northern latitude in the hydrological cycle in models and reanalyses supervised by Olga Zolina, Maria SANTOLARIA-OTIN and Ambroise DUFOUR

Hydrological cycle - Models - Reanalyses

Report

Popular Topics

Arctic CLASSIC Climate CMIP6 Deep Learning EGU GCM High Mountain Asia HMASR IPCC LMDZ LSM Model Mountain Areas Ocean ORCHIDEE Parameterization Snow SWE YouTube

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