SISB biographies

NERC is committed to being open and transparent, and so here we provide some background on members of NERC's Science & Innovation Strategy Board. A register of board members' interests is also publicly available.

Professor Philip England

Chairman

Philip is the Professor of Geology in the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Oxford. Before joining the Department in 1986, he held a faculty post in the Department of Earth & Planetary Sciences at Harvard and, before that, held a NERC post-doctoral fellowship, then an IBM fellowship at Cambridge. His first degree was in physics at Bristol, and he has a DPhil in geophysics from Oxford.

Philip's research covers several aspects of tectonics, including continental deformation, metamorphism, and the thermal and mechanical structure of subduction zones. He has published many theoretical papers on the dynamics of continental deformation, including several studies of the links between surface faulting and the motions of the deeper lithosphere. He has also been closely involved measurements of deformation, including more than 20 GPS campaigns in Greece, New Zealand and Italy.

Professor Elizabeth Baggs

Liz holds the Established Chair of soil science and is Head of the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Aberdeen. She has a degree in physical geography (University of Bristol), a MSc in agronomy (University of Nottingham) and a PhD in soil science (University of Edinburgh). Following her PhD she took up a lectureship at Wye College, University of London, and a Wain research fellowship at Imperial College London. In 2004 she moved to the University of Aberdeen on a NERC advanced fellowship. She is currently president elect of the British Society of Soil Science, a Fellow of the Society of Biology, a member of the NERC Peer Review College, and is on the Editorial board of several journals.

Liz's research interests cover plant-soil interactions, soil biogeochemistry and soil fertility. Much of her research focus is on greenhouse gas production in soils, developing and applying stable isotope approaches to link process measurements with characterisation of the underpinning microbiology and biochemistry. She has pioneered the development of isotope enrichment approaches for quantifying and distinguishing between different nitrous oxide producing processes in soil, and for examining interactions between carbon and nitrogen cycles. Current interest is in plant regulation of rhizosphere processes. The majority of her research has been funded by NERC and BBSRC.

Dr Adrian Baker

Adrian is the Chief Scientist for the Environmental Sciences Department of the Defence Science & Technology Laboratory (Dstl), which is an agency of the Ministry of Defence (MOD). He is responsible for the quality of the scientific outputs from the Department and for ensuring that the right capabilities are in place to satisfy MOD and other Government Department requirements for science and technology advice. Adrian is part of the end-user community for NERC science.

In 1994 Adrian completed a PhD in hydrogeology, developing resistivity imaging and other methods for assessing the migration of contaminants through clays, with particular focus on the clays beneath the British Nuclear Fuels Ltd Drigg site. He then undertook a short post-doctoral research project before joining AEA Technology, at the time part of the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA). Adrian spent the following nine years undertaking research and consultancy focusing on the migration and remediation of both radioactive and non-radioactive contaminants in the terrestrial environment. During this time, Adrian worked on issues at a wide range of UK nuclear sites, including the UKAEA sites at Harwell, Dounreay and Winfrith; the civil nuclear power stations at Berkeley, Hunterston, and Chapelcross; and the Atomic Weapons Establishment. He also undertook studies on numerous other sites both in the UK and overseas, including investigating the risks to local populations from uranium mining in the Slovak Paradise National Park.

After joining Dstl in 2003, Adrian led aspects of the MOD Depleted Uranium research programme and investigated the impacts on the environment of contaminants that have specific military applications (eg tungsten, radium and white phosphorous). He also became the lead technical advisor for contaminated land issues at Porton Down. He has interests in radiation detection, the protection of personnel from ionising radiation hazards, the migration of contaminants in the environment, contaminated land and ground/surface water pollution.

Professor Paul Bates

Paul is Director of the Cabot Institute at the University of Bristol and Professor of Hydrology in the School of Geographical Sciences. His principal research concerns the fluid dynamics and modelling of flooding, but he has widespread research interests in risk, resilience, uncertainty, governance and decision-making in relation to natural hazards and global water issues. Following a PhD at Bristol and postdoctoral research funded by the US Army Corps of Engineers, NERC and Electricité de France, Paul was appointed to a lectureship at Bristol in 1995 and promoted to a Chair in 2003. He has held Visiting Scientist positions at Princeton University, Laboratoire National d'Hydraulique, Paris, the EU Joint Research Centre, Ispra, Italy and the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Paul's main science contribution has been to improve the prediction of flood inundation through the development of new computer models, the use of data from new airborne, satellite and ground sensors and through the better characterisation of risk and uncertainty, and in 2012 he was awarded the Lloyd's Science of Risk prize for this work. He also undertakes significant International collaboration, including work with NASA, the French National Space Agency (CNES), Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia in Brazil, as well as numerous universities in the US and Europe, and is part of the mission science team for the forthcoming NASA/CNES Surface Water Ocean Topography mission due for launch in 2020.

Professor Stephen Belcher

Stephen is the Joint Met Office Chair in Weather Systems at the Department of Meteorology, University of Reading. In this role he is responsible for developing the research partnership between the Met Office and the University of Reading. Before taking this role, he was Head of Department of Meteorology, and then Head of School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences at the University of Reading. Stephen has a degree in Mathematics and a PhD in Fluid Mechanics from DAMTP, University of Cambridge.

Stephen's expertise is in the dynamics of the atmosphere and oceans. The goal of his research is to understand new processes that improve weather and climate prediction models. Examples include the meteorology of cities, mixing in the upper ocean and the exchange of carbon dioxide between forests and the atmosphere.

This range of topics has brought Stephen into contact with a wide range of collaborators. For example, he worked with architects and building designers to quantify the impact of the external environment and of climate change on the energy demand within buildings. He also has wide experience of the user community: he spent five years working one day per week at the consulting company Arup helping to develop business in environmental modelling. He has served on a number of committees advising Government Departments.

Dr Andy Brown

Andy leads the Foundation Science directorate at the Met Office. This section performs underpinning science and model development critical to both weather and climate prediction. Many aspects of the work involve close collaboration with NERC, and Andy is on the Strategic Programme Board of the Met Office/NERC Joint Weather and Climate Research Programme.

Andy joined the Met Office in 1990 after gaining a BA in Physics at Oxford University. He initially worked on large-eddy modelling and parametrisation of the atmospheric boundary layer, completing a PhD on turbulence modelling at the University of Surrey. He has since worked on and published widely across a wide range of atmospheric processes, including cumulus convection and flow over hills, and their improved representation in numerical models. He has also spent a year on secondment at the European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting (ECMWF).

Andy is active internationally, co-chairing the Working Group for Numerical Experimentation (WGNE) which is co-sponsored by the World Meteorological Organization Commission for Atmospheric Sciences (CAS) and the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP). He is also involved with a number of other WMO and WCRP committees.

Professor Terry Burke

Terry is Professor of Molecular Ecology and Director of Research & Innovation in the Faculty of Science at the University of Sheffield. He is also the Head of the Sheffield node of the NERC Biomolecular Analysis Facility (NBAF), which he founded in 1998. Terry is also the coordinating Director of NBAF, which has five nodes across the country that together offer a suite of analytical services in genomics, metabolomics and bioinformatics to the UK environmental science community.

He studied Zoology at Bangor, before completing a PhD in ecological genetics at Nottingham. He then moved to Leicester, where he was supported by a series of research council and Royal Society fellowships, before taking up an academic position, ultimately leading to a personal chair in molecular ecology. He moved to the Department of Animal & Plant Sciences in Sheffield in 1998 where he established the Molecular Ecology Laboratory.

Terry's research has focused on understanding behaviour, demography and evolution in natural populations through the use of genetic marker systems, especially DNA profiling, to measure genetic relationships among individuals and populations. Current studies are concerned with measuring gene flow among populations and identifying the genomic basis of adaptation. These studies are particularly relevant to conservation biology and understanding the consequences of climate change. Terry also co-directs a knowledge exchange programme in which geneticists and evolutionary biologists are working with conservation practitioners and policymakers to better understand and improve the management of natural populations of plants and animals.

Professor Stephen de Mora

Steve is the Chief Executive of both the Plymouth Marine Laboratory and PML Applications Ltd, and an Honorary Visiting Professor in Biosciences at the University of Exeter. Educated in chemistry and oceanography, he obtained a BSc from the University College of Swansea and a PhD from UBC, Vancouver.

He has taught chemistry, environmental science and oceanography at universities in the United Kingdom (University of Lancaster), New Zealand (University of Auckland) and Canada (Université de Québec a Rimouski). After a 20 year career in academia, he joined the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Marine Environment Laboratory in Monaco. Through the IAEA, he worked with several Regional Seas Programmes and Global Environment Facility (GEF) projects around the world.

Steve was awarded a Distinguished Service Award in the year that the IAEA was a co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in 2005. Before returning to the UK to take up the position at PML in 2008, he had established an environmental consultancy based in Canada working for various UN bodies and the World Bank on assignment mostly in Eastern Europe, Western Asia and Central Africa.

His areas of research expertise include environmental analytical chemistry, marine pollution monitoring & assessment, chemical oceanography, biogeochemistry, and polar science. Steve has undertaken research missions at sea, and in both the Arctic region and Antarctica.

Dr Catherine Duigan

Catherine is a member of the research user community and the senior management team at the Countryside Council for Wales (CCW) in Bangor. She has a keen appreciation of the role which sound science plays when formulating advice to government and the importance of communication across the science-policy interface. As Head of the Marine & Freshwater Ecosystems Group at CCW, she leads a group of technical specialists who are working on the environmental evidence base needed to underpin nature conservation and environmental management in Wales.

She completed her BSc and PhD at University College Dublin but carried out some of her doctoral work on zooplankton communities in Irish lakes at Indiana University. She was a post-doctoral researcher at Aberystwyth University studying environmental change inferred from diatoms in lakes sediments from Morocco. She has also worked for the Nature Conservancy Council for Scotland surveying lakes on the Isle of Skye. She joined CCW in 1992 and so has almost 20 years of experience of working in a government sponsored agency. Her publications focus on nature conservation and Welsh freshwater habitats, and she has co-edited a book, The Rivers of Wales (Margraf 2009).

Catherine was a member of the NERC Peer Review Panel. She represents CCW interests on the Joint Nature Conservation Committee Inter-Agency Science Management Group and the UK Marine Assessment & Reporting Group. She is a Fellow of the Linnean Society and the Society of Biology, and an active member of the Freshwater Biological Association and former Council Member. She contributes to the teaching of freshwater conservation at Bangor University.

Professor Gideon Henderson

Gideon is Professor of Earth Sciences and Associate Head (Research) of the Earth Science Department at the University of Oxford. Before taking up a faculty position at Oxford he was an Associate Research Scientist at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University (US). He has a degree in Earth Sciences from the University of Oxford, and a PhD in Geochemistry from the University of Cambridge.

Gideon is a geochemist working to understand the long-term operation of the climate system and the role of ocean chemistry in the carbon and climate systems. His palaeoclimate research focuses particularly on the Quaternary and makes use of multiple archives (including marine cores, molluscs, and stalagmites) to provide high, sometimes seasonal, resolution information about the patterns and process of past change. This work strives to understand components of the climate system with particular relevance to the future, including changes in rainfall, sea-level, and ocean circulation. His expertise in uranium-series geochemistry helps to place these palaeoclimate records into a precise chronological framework.

This expertise also provides information about the rates of process in the modern ocean. In this area, Gideon's research focuses on understanding the cycling of critical micronutrients such as Fe and Zn in the oceans, and on the calibration of proxies used to understand present and past ocean processes. He presently co-chairs the international programme on marine chemistry, GEOTRACES. He also co-directs the 21st Century Ocean Institute (part of the James Martin School for the 21st Century) with a remit to understand natural and human imposed changes in the marine carbon cycle during the present century.

Professor Mike Kendall

Mike is Professor of Seismology and Head of the School of Earth Sciences at the University of Bristol. He has a PhD in geophysics from Queen's University in Canada and he was a NSERC postdoctoral fellow at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in the USA. He has had faculty positions at the University of Toronto and the University of Leeds, and he worked briefly for Chevron Canada Resources in Calgary. He is currently president of the British Geophysical Association and vice-president (geophysics) of the Royal Astronomical Society.

Mike's research interests cover pure and applied seismology, with connections to mineralogy, tectonics/geodynamics and engineering. Current research in global geophysics concentrates on the nature of the core-mantle boundary, continental cratons, continental rifting, mid-ocean ridges and subduction zones. He has led seismic field experiments in a range of geologic settings.

Techniques developed to study wave propagation in the deep Earth have also been applied to his research in exploration seismology. His interests lie in microseismicity and passive seismic monitoring, rock-fracture characterisation, and linked geophysics, geomechanics and fluid-flow modelling. He has managed a number of large industry-funded consortia.

Professor Georgina Mace CBE

Georgina Mace is Professor of Conservation Science at Imperial College London. Her research interests are in measuring the trends and consequences of biodiversity loss and ecosystem change. She led the process to develop, test and document criteria for listing species on IUCN's Red List of threatened species, and subsequently worked on the biodiversity elements of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment and on the technical development of measures for the Convention on Biological Diversity 2010 biodiversity target. Recently she has worked on the UK National Ecosystem Assessment, is a co-investigator on the NERC Valuing Nature Network, and is an Associate Director of the Ecosystem Services for Poverty Alleviation programme that is funded by DfID, NERC and ESRC.

She studied zoology at the University of Liverpool and then did a PhD in evolutionary ecology at the University of Sussex. Following postdoctoral positions at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC, the University of Newcastle upon Tyne and University College London, she became a research fellow at the Institute of Zoology in London. From 2000 to 2006 she was Director of Science at the Zoological Society of London and Head of the Institute of Zoology. In 2006 she moved to Imperial College London as Director of the NERC Centre for Population Biology.

She was awarded a CBE in 2007, elected FRS in 2002, and was the 2007 winner of the international Cosmos prize. She has served on several NERC committees including Peer Review Committees and as a member of the Science & Innovation Strategy Board from 2000-2005. She is President of the British Ecological Society (2011-2013) and a member of the 2014 REF panel for Earth & Environmental Sciences. She was President of the Society for Conservation Biology (2007-2009) and is Vice Chair of the Scientific Committee of the international programme on biodiversity science Diversitas (2007-2011).

Dr Phil Newton

Phil joined NERC in 1999 as marine sciences manager, then moving to Deputy Director of Science & Innovation, through to his current role as NERC's Director for Science Delivery. Phil has a degree in chemistry (Bristol) and a PhD in environmental chemistry and oceanography (UEA).

Formerly he was a NERC funded & Royal Society funded marine biogeochemist, and subsequently headed a marine research group within the French Atomic Energy Agency, focused on biogeochemical cycling in the sub-tropical Atlantic Ocean, Southern Ocean and Mediterranean Sea. Prior to joining NERC, he spent five years in the private sector as an editor at Nature, with responsibility for the journal's environmental science content.

Professor Paul Rodhouse

Paul Rodhouse is a biological oceanographer at the British Antarctic Survey. He has been a member of the Board and Head of the Biological Sciences Division at BAS and was recently the Board Member for Science Resource. He is the Principal Scientist for the South Georgia Government's Fisheries Laboratory at King Edward Point. This is where BAS undertakes commissioned research to underpin the ecosystem approach to fisheries management in Antarctic waters and deliver science for UK Government policy in the context of CCAMLR.

Paul's research career has been concerned with the biology, ecology and sustainable management of living marine resources in the Antarctic, South Atlantic, Peru Current, USA, Ireland and the UK. His recent research has been on recruitment processes in short-lived species, on spatial dynamics of fishing fleets, and on interactions between commercial fisheries and higher predators. He took his first degree in biological sciences at Westfield College, London and his MSc and PhD in oceanography at the University of Southampton. Before joining BAS he was employed by University College, Galway and by the State University of New York at Stony Brook and on joining BAS he spent a year at the Marine Biological Association in Plymouth.

He has supervised ten PhD students and is an honorary Professor in the Department of Zoology, University of Aberdeen. He was awarded a DSc by the University of Southampton in 1994 and is a senior member of St Edmund's College, Cambridge.

Professor William Sutherland

William Sutherland holds the Miriam Rothschild Chair in Conservation Biology at the University of Cambridge. His main research interest has been in linking behaviour and population ecology through a combination of theoretical research and field studies. This work is summarised in his Oxford University Press monograph From Individual Behaviour to Population Ecology. He has wide research interests.

He has written four books and edited six others. He established, and is series editor for, the Techniques in Ecology & Conservation series with Oxford University Press and is an Editor in Chief for Conservation Letters and for Conservation Evidence. He set up the Gratis book scheme to give conservation books to developing countries, which donated over five thousand new books to 132 countries. He was awarded the Marsh Award for Ecology, the Scientific Medal of the Zoological Society London, the Marsh Award for Conservation Biology, and the British Ecological Society's Ecological Engagement Award. He is also an ISI highly-cited researcher.

He is President Elect of the British Ecological Society and a member of the NERC Review panel, of the External Scientific Advisory Panel of the Centro de Biologia Ambiental Faculdade de Ciências da Universidade de Lisboa, of the Scientific Council of Tour du Valat, and of the Synchronicity Earth Advisory Committee. He is also Ambassador of the European Congress of Conservation Biology 2012, Editor in Chief of Conservation Letters and serves on the Natural England Science Strategy Committee.

He is particularly interested in developing new links between science and practice including developing the process of routine horizon scanning, in expanding the use of evidence-based conservation including through the Conservation Evidence website. He is an Associate Fellow of the Cambridge Centre for Science & Policy.

Professor Graham Underwood

Graham is Professor of Marine and Freshwater Biology in the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Essex. He has recently completed a period as Head of School, he is a member of the NERC peer review college 'Panel of Chairs' and is a member of the DEFRA Scientific Advisory Panel on Marine Conservation Zones.

He studied Zoology with microbiology at the University of Reading, and carried out his PhD on freshwater grazer-macrophyte-epiphyte interactions at the University of Sussex. After a short period of postdoctoral research, working at Bristol University on microbial biostabilisation of intertidal mudflats in the Severn Estuary, he moved to Essex in 1992.

His research interests lie in the areas of freshwater ecology and estuarine, coastal and shallow sea biology. A major focus is on the interactions between autotrophic (microalgae) and heterotrophic microbial activity and the role of dissolved organic carbon, nutrients, light, and spatial and temporal variability. A strong theme throughout his work has been to relate the biogeochemical functioning of microbial biofilms to their species composition, emphasising the important of different species in responding to the environment. especially in the primary production, physiology and ecology of benthic microalgal biofilms (microphytobenthos). This work has demonstrated the importance of coastal zone shallow water habitats to the functioning of marine systems, the transformation of nutrients (nitrogen and carbon particularly), and the impacts of eutrophication. His broader research interests include the biology of invertebrates, habitat use and fragmentation on the coast, endangered and invasive species, coastal geomorphology and sea level rise. The majority of his work has been based in the U.K., but he has also carried out research in the Baltic, Mediterranean and South African environments, tropical systems in the Indo-pacific and the Bahamas, and more recently studying Antarctic and Arctic sea ice communities.

Dr Jim Wharfe

Jim is currently the senior scientific advisor to the Evidence Directorate in the Environment Agency. Jim completed his PhD (London) in 1975 on pollution impacts in estuarine ecosystems. He has worked for Government Departments, the Environment Agency and its predecessor bodies for more that 30 years and has been involved with the commissioning and translation of scientific research to policy development and decision-making.

Until recently Jim was the Head of Science Programmes at the Environment Agency that involved research effort across a broad spectrum of environmental issues ranging from global challenges on climate change and sustainable resources, to regional and local issues concerning integrated catchment management, environment and human health, flooding, and better regulation. Jim has also managed the Environment Agency National Centre on Ecotoxicology & Hazardous substances.

His interests range widely over science issues in the environment and the transfer of knowledge into policy. Of particular interest is the strategic development of new and emerging technologies to improve our understanding of multiple stressor effects on both wildlife and human health, and their application to enhance our environmental monitoring networks.

Jim is on a number of science advisory groups and a member of the Ministerial Marine Science Coordination Committee.

Professor Ian Wright

Ian is Deputy-Director of Science & Technology, National Oceanography Centre and is based in Southampton. Before joining NOC in 2008, he was a Principal Scientist at the National Institute of Water & Atmospheric Research (NIWA), New Zealand, and led NIWA's National Centre for Coasts and Oceans. He has a PhD in geology / geophysics from Victoria University of Wellington (NZ).

Ian is a marine geologist with wide research interests in understanding interaction and feedback between the solid earth and ocean. This research has largely focussed around submarine volcanism, understanding sub-seafloor structure and seafloor geological control of magma emplacement and hydrothermal fluid flow expulsion, arc magma genesis, physical volcanology of submarine eruptions and associated caldera development, submarine volcano sourced tsunami generation and propagation, and seamount evolution. The latter has included working with biologists understanding relationships between seamount substrate and seafloor longevity, and biological diversity and function. Ian also has active research interest in exploration geophysics with application to seafloor ore mineralisation.

More latterly his expertise and research interest in solid earth - ocean interaction is being applied to understand seepage of methane fluids from dissociating sub-seafloor methane hydrates beneath Arctic shelf seas and the potential (and impact) of carbon dioxide release from proposed offshore carbon storage sites. The latter research includes study of natural carbon dioxide seep sites, and existing storage sites in the North Sea. Both the Arctic methane hydrate and carbon storage leakage research is associated with collaborative technology research to develop seafloor observatories and instrumentation to undertake sustained observing of seafloor fluid expulsion, and directly measure greenhouse gas flux venting from the seafloor.