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New Director for NERC Centre for Ecology & Hydrology

26 July 2012

Professor Mark Bailey has been appointed Director of NERC's Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (CEH) with effect from 1 August 2012.

Professor Bailey has been associated with NERC for many years. After graduating with a degree in microbiology and a PhD in insect virology, he spent four years as a postdoctoral fellow studying bacterial pathogenicity before moving to Oxford to establish the Molecular Microbial Ecology Group.

In 2002, he was appointed Director of CEH's Oxford site, the former NERC Institute of Virology & Environmental Microbiology, before becoming Science Director for the CEH Biodiversity Programme in 2003, and Acting Director of CEH in 2011.

Professor Bailey said, "I am delighted to take on the role of Director CEH. I would like to take this opportunity to thank all CEH staff for their support over the last 18 months while in my capacity as Acting Director. This has been a most enjoyable period and I look forward to working with staff, collaborators and our stakeholders, in leading CEH and promoting the scientific excellence of the organisation."

NERC Chief Executive, Professor Duncan Wingham, said, "Mark has made a very substantial contribution to both CEH and NERC's corporate activities since taking over as Acting Director last year. He is well respected within NERC, with the research community and other stakeholders. His knowledge and dynamism will ensure CEH continues to evolve as an internationally-renowned research centre."

Professor Bailey succeeds Professor Pat Nuttall, who takes up a new role within NERC's senior management team at Swindon.

Professor Wingham said, "I should like to express my thanks to Pat for her work in developing and shaping CEH into a world-class research centre, with an enviable reputation in its field."

Further information

NERC Press Office
Natural Environment Research Council
Polaris House, North Star Avenue
Swindon, SN2 1EU
Tel: 01793 411561
Mob: 07917 557215

Notes

1. In addition to his work within NERC, Professor Bailey is an Inaugural Fellow of the Society of Biology and a Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology. He is Visiting Professor, School of Plant & Animal Sciences, at the University of Sheffield; Honorary Professor, School of Biosciences, Cardiff University; and Visiting Professor, Department of Agricultural & Engineering Sciences, Newcastle. He is a member of the Board of Trustees for the National Biodiversity Network and Rothamsted Research, and Chair of the Steering Committee for the Environmental Change Network.

Professor Bailey sits on the recently funded Executive Committee of the EU FP7 EcoFINDERS project, the strategic goal of which is to provide the EC with tools to design and implement soil strategies aimed at ensuring sustainable use of soils. He is also a founder member of TerraGenome, the international consortium that is collaborating to produce the first full microbial sequence of a reference soil; and a member of the Earth Microbiome Project, which aims to analyse microbial communities across the globe.

He is a Senior Editor for the ISME Journal and Journal of Microbial Methods, and on the editorial boards for FEMS Microbial Ecology and Environmental Microbiology. He was also Editor of Applied Environmental Microbiology between 2003 and 2008.

2. CEH is the UK's Centre of Excellence for integrated research in the land and freshwater ecosystems and their interaction with the atmosphere. CEH is part of the Natural Environment Research Council, employs more than 450 people at four major sites in England, Scotland and Wales, hosts over 150 PhD students, and has an overall budget of about £35m. CEH tackles complex environmental challenges to deliver practicable solutions so that future generations can benefit from a rich and healthy environment.

3. NERC is the UK's main agency for funding and managing world-class research, training and knowledge exchange in the environmental sciences. It coordinates some of the world's most exciting research projects, tackling major issues such as climate change, food security, environmental influences on human health, the genetic make-up of life on earth, and much more. NERC receives around £300m a year from the government's science budget, which it uses to fund research and training in universities and its own research centres.

Press release: 20/12

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