Aquatic Environments Research Centre
The Aquatic Environments Research Centre (AERC) was founded in 1995. Staff conduct interdisciplinary research on the structure, function, problems and management of a range of different aquatic environments and are members of the school .
Staff in the Aquatic Environments Research Centre are also members of HYDRA, the HYDrosciences Research Associations for strategic multi-disciplinary research in water science, policy and management. Professor Penny Johnes is its Executive Director. Membership comprises water science research groups from the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, the British Geological Survey, Imperial College London, Queen Mary College, University of London, University College London, and the universities of Reading and Oxford. It's main objective is to undertake strategic hydrosciences research through collaboration between member organisations, policy makers and industry.
Current Projects
Novel technologies for environmental monitoring is an ESPRC funded project aiming to advance the science of hydrochemistry and initiate development of a new generation of catchment pollutant transport models. A research studentship is associated with this project.
Water, Life and Civilisation project was funded by the Leverhulme Trust and involves staff from across the School of Human and Environmental Science at the University of Reading including Professor Whitehead and Dr Wade from the Aquatic Environments Research Centre, together with collaborators from the NERC National Centre for Atmospheric Science (NCAS) and the Council for British Research in the Levant. The project has been designed to assess how changes in hydrology and climate have impacted human activities in the past, present and future within the semi-arid regions of the Middle East and North Africa. Read more about the project on the web site. The project completes in 2009.
Recently Completed Projects
UK Water Industry Research has recently funded a new programme on Validation of Operational Guidelines for the Sustainable Application of Phosphorus in Biosolids to Agricultural Soils - Phase 2. The project is being led by Paul Withers, from ADAS.
The objectives of the project are to build on recommendations identified in previous UKWIR (SL02 – B Application of Phosphorus in Biosolids to agricultural soils ) project, and provide a robust scientific basis for the development of sustainable operational guidelines for recycling of biosolids to agricultural land that will have a minimum impact on the freshwater environment.The University of Reading has been invited to take part in the project, to assist in:
- Validating soil P thresholds previously developed in the Laboratory (UKWIR project SL02 – B) under field conditions at a regional scale
- Validating rates of soil P accumulation for different types of biosolids and soil developed in the laboratory (UKWIR project SL02- B) under field conditions at a regional scale, and
- Updating and adapting operational guidelines for recycling of biosolids ot agricultural land
The ADAS project started in July 2008, with the subcontract to the University of Reading being set up to start from 01/01/2009, ending 30/06/09.Professor Penny Johnes managed the Reading subcontract, with Dr Nicola Flynn as Senior Research Fellow and Dr Geoff Warren as Research Officer, responsible for the laboratory analyses of soil samples sent to Reading by ADAS field staff.
Euro-limpacs is a €20m Integrated Project funded by the EU designed to assess the effects of future global change on Europe's freshwater ecosystems. The project was co-ordinated by the Environment Change Research Centre, University College London, and consisted of 36 partners including staff at the Aquatic Environments Research Centre, University of Reading (Whitehead, Skeffington, Wade) who lead the Work Package 6: Integrated Catchment Analysis and Modelling. Euro-limpacs ran from February 2004 through to January 2009.