Soil aggregates, essentially the building blocks from which soils are composed, control many soil properties on which our understanding of many of the major challenges facing society depend; how much air or water the soil can hold in order to grow sufficient crops to feed ourselves. By applying X-ray computed tomography, soil researchers have recently […]
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You will reconstruct different landform assemblages from geophysical and sedimentological data, revealing how landscapes have evolved offshore the UK and Ireland from the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) to the present day. Why do we care about palaeo-landscapes? Studying the sedimentary records of former ice sheets provides insights into ongoing changes in warming polar regions. Most […]
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This project investigates how increasing atmospheric CO2 concentration impacts on greenhouse gas release from wetlands which provides an important feedback on the global climate. Today natural wetlands are the greatest emitters of atmospheric methane, a process of which plants are important controls. By the end of this century atmospheric CO2 concentrations may reach 800 ppm […]
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Mangroves provide a wide variety of ecosystem services to some of the poorest people on the planet. Under natural conditions, mangroves can persist in an incredibly improbable edaphic (“soil”) environment, characterized by repeated wave action and high salinity, by modifying their internal environment with roots, stems and canopy. Increasingly, however, mangrove systems are subject to […]
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Many cuttings and embankments within the UK transport and utilities infrastructure networks were constructed more than 100 years ago and were poorly engineered. Consequently many of these structures are deteriorating and are prone to disruptive failure, particularly during periods of prolonged rainfall, as exemplified by recent extreme weather events. Considerable resources for maintenance and remediation […]
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When storms cause trees to break or become uprooted they can be responsible for loss of lives, destruction of buildings/infrastructure and disruption to transport, energy and communications networks. It is possible to reduce the risks of tree failure by pruning or removing dangerous trees. However, given the large numbers of trees it is very difficult […]
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With increasing energy prices and advances in drilling and hydraulic rock fracturing (‘fracking’) technology, shale gas has radically changed the energy landscape over the world. However, knowledge on how the gases are trapped within the rock, adsorbed on its surface, dissolved in the pore spaces waters and released after fracking are all poorly constrained. An […]
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We have recently found convincing evidence that soil dust contamination of food is an important (non-haem) dietary source of iron in several sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries. In rural Malawi, composite diet analysis of two villages and calculated food composition data were compared against iron biomarkers. Measured iron intake was greater than calculated intake, and highly […]
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Long-range insect migration occurs on an enormous scale and provides huge costs and benefits to agricultural ecosystems. Insect population dynamics and migration phenology are both strongly influenced by climate, and thus patterns of insect migration are likely to be highly responsive to global environmental change. It is vitally important to understand such changes if we […]
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The norm is to be exposed to a wide range of infectious organisms and most wild animals are infected with a wide range of parasites. Yet in modern societies we humans are infected with relatively few parasites and as a consequence the hygiene hypothesis suggests we are developing autoimmune diseases and allergies. Laboratory mice are […]
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