Team
DR CHRIS STEER MANAGING DIRECTOR
Dr Chris Steer is a physicist, entrepreneur, and Co-Founder and Managing Director of Geoptic. With more than 20 years of experience in advanced sensing and commercial muon imaging, he has led major projects across subsurface CO2 monitoring, tunnels, nuclear waste, and buried infrastructure, including the world’s first muon image of a subsurface stored CO2 plume. Previously, he led the UK’s first industrial muon imaging team.
PROF LEE THOMPSON TECHNICAL DIRECTOR
Prof. Lee Thompson is a particle physicist with leadership experience in major international programmes at CERN, Fermilab and J-PARC. A former head of particle physics at the University of Sheffield, he has deep expertise in advanced detector and calibration systems, including neutrino observatories such as ANTARES and KM3NeT. At Geoptic, he works as part of the management team across customer engagement, project delivery and international representation.
PROF JON GLUYAS CHAIR
Prof Jon Gluyas is a geoscientist with a career both in industry and academia. A common theme running throughout his work has been fluid-rock interaction and he has worked on petroleum, natural hydrogen, helium and geothermal systems as well as on carbon geostorage and human induced seismicity. He has founded numerous resource exploration companies, several Earth observation companies and the UK National Geothermal Centre. Jon has just completed a term as the President of the Geological Society and in the past has served as the president of the PESGB, the Earth Science Teachers Association and been Chairman of the British Geological Survey board.
Geoptic’s Growth
Our Start
Geoptic is a product of four co-founders, working within three UK Universities. The team has lifelong deep interests in Geoscience, Particle and Nuclear Physics, and a technology path to bring a new way of imaging engineering structures.
Our Growth
The company was founded in 2020 to exploit the natural flux of muons at the Earth’s surface which then led to the company’s solution for the UK railways’ historic concealed shaft challenge. Geoptic continue to deliver bespoke applied muon imaging R&D for its clients leading to a growing IP portfolio and its reputation for trusted delivery of scientific and engineering results.
Our Present
In March 2025, Geoptic reached the significant milestone of passing five years of supporting the international engineering community. As the company and staff celebrated, they realise that there is more to come given the richness of physics within the Earth’s natural cosmic ray background.
Our Co-Founding University Partners
Geoptic is proud to work closely with its UK University partners, and grateful for their continued support.
As a co-founding University, Durham has a long experience of technology transfer and scientific commercialisation, and is a leading University.
St Mary’s University, Twickenham, is one of the UK’s newest and most vibrant universities, and is having significant impact with its Applied Sciences. Researchers from St Mary’s have worked with many national and international organisations, from the UK’s National Ballet to Chelsea Football Club
The University of Sheffield takes research from the laboratory to world, and Geoptic is a clear example of Sheffield’s long-term economic impact. Sheffield spin-outs have significant societal benefits and are fifth in the UK in recent national assessments.