Faculty news and events
National Agricultural Lecture, Royal Agricultural Society of England
March 2012
Congratulations to Emeritus Professor Sir John Marsh who received the Royal Agricultural Society of England (RASE) National Agricultural Award for his service to the agriculture industry, and delivered the National Agricultural Lecture at RASE's President's Seminar on 28 February 2012. In his lecture, Sir John pointed-out that "knowing more is not enough. Application is the pay day for research", and criticised the European Commission's present CAP reform proposals.
Reading leads on new food security research studentships funded by BBSRC
January 2012
Universities and Science Minister David Willetts visited the food pilot plant and cocoa glasshouses at the University on 24 January 2012 to launch a £67m national BBSRC funding scheme for PhD studentships, of which a consortium of the universities of Southampton, Surrey and Lancaster and Rothamsted Research led by Reading has been awarded £1.8m for studentships which will address the challenges of feeding the globe's population healthily and in a sustainable way. More information on new PhD research opportunities in food security can be found here.
Pharmacy academic awarded medal for research into new materials
January 2012
Congratulations to Dr Vitaliy Khutoryanskiy, Pharmacy, who has been awarded the prestigious 2012 McBain Medal from the Royal Society of Chemistry and the Society of Chemical Industry for his visionary work in the field of colloid, polymer and interface science.
OBE for services to scientific research
January 2012
Many congratulations to psychologist Professor Dianne Berry who was awarded an OBE for services to scientific research in the 2012 New Year Honours List.
University Pharmacy student receives prestigious industry award
December 2011
Congratulations to fourth year Pharmacy student Ranveer Bassey, who has won the 'Future of Pharmacy Student Award' at the Alliance Healthcare Pharmacy Awards. This prestigious award recognises Ranveer's innovative ideas to help pharmacies deliver the Government healthcare agenda.
Professor Ian Hamley accepts Royal Society award
December 2011
Congratulations to Professor Ian Hamley in Chemistry who has been awarded a prestigious Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award. The award will provide a five-year funding boost for Professor Hamley's groundbreaking research into peptides, tiny parts of proteins that occur naturally and have an important biological function in the human body.
Teaching and learning awards in Life Sciences
November 2011
Each year, the Centre for the Development of Teaching and Learning (CDoTL) recognises and rewards the sustained and outstanding contributions of staff to teaching and learning at the University. Awards made to staff in Life Sciences included:
- Early Career Fellow 2011-12: Dr Katja Strohfeldt (Pharmacy)
- Faculty Awards for Outstanding Contributions to Teaching and Learning: Dr Francesca Greco (Pharmacy) and Dr Carmel Houston-Price (Psychology)
- Faculty Awards for Teaching and Learning: Dr Darren Juniper (Agriculture) and Dr Graham Holloway (Biological Sciences)
- Team Award for Outstanding Contributions to Teaching and Learning: Food and Nutritional Sciences
Congratulations to all this year's award winners!
Agriculture and Food Minister visits the University's Centre for Dairy Research
November 2011
Government Minister Jim Paice visited the Centre for Dairy Research on 31 October 2011 to highlight research improving the measurement of greenhouse gas emissions as a part of the international meeting Global ReseArCH4 inveN2Ory. The meeting provided an opportunity for academics and industry from across the world to view the latest measurement techniques, particularly around methane and nitrous oxide emitted by livestock, soil and manure.
Staff in Life Sciences honoured by students in RUSU Gold Star Awards 2011
July 2011
Dr Patricia Riddell, School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences, has received a Gold Star Award from RUSU for her outstanding contribution to teaching and learning. A total of 365 nominations were received for the six awards from students wanting to show their appreciation to those members of staff who had helped and inspired them throughout the year. Comments received from students who had nominated Dr Riddell included:
"A truly wonderful woman who has been supportive and exceptionally understanding during difficult problems regarding my dissertation."
"The advice she gave was invaluable and knowing that I had her support and encouraging words has made the year so much easier."
The Faculty passes its congratulations to Dr Riddell.
Gold for Chocolate at Chelsea Flower Show 2011
May 2011
The 2011 Chelsea Flower Show stand outlines the role the University of Reading is playing in safeguarding the future of chocolate through maintaining the International Cocoa Quarantine Centre (ICQC). The ICQC handles all international movement of cocoa breeding material. It is the only facility of its kind in the world and is essential to ensuring that cocoa biodiversity is not just conserved, but also utilised. The team from the School of Biological Sciences were awarded a gold medal for the exhibition which took top honours in the Continuous Learning Awards.
Professor Mark Pagel elected to Royal Society Fellowship
May 2011
Many congratulations to Professor Mark Pagel, School of Biological Sciences, on his election to the Fellowship of the Royal Society. Mark leads the Evolution Group at the University of Reading and is an evolutionary theorist with interests in mathematical and statistical modelling of evolutionary processes.
Professor of Global Food Security
April 2011
Professor Peter Gregory has been appointed Chief Executive of East Malling Research (EMR) and simultaneously Professor of Global Food Security at the University of Reading from 1 May 2011. Until recently, Professor Gregory was the Chief Executive and Director of the Scottish Crops Research Institute. Prior to that he was Pro-Vice-Chancellor at the University of Reading. Professor Gregory will spend four days a week at EMR and the remaining day at the University of Reading working with Reading's Centre for Food Security and its Director, Professor Richard Tiffin.
Speaking about his appointment, Professor Gregory said, 'I am delighted to be joining as Chief Executive at a time when fruit and food are back in the public eye. EMR's outstanding research is a key element of the UK's future food and farming excellence. My role at the University of Reading will allow me to project EMR's work internationally and to bring a new generation of students into direct contact with the practicalities and challenges of producing and marketing high quality horticultural foods'.
Water for agriculture: Implications for future policy and practice
October 2010
UK agriculture and horticulture face major water shortages in coming decades due to climate change, concludes a new joint report commissioned by the Royal Agricultural Society of England (RASE) and carried-out by University of Reading scientists in the Walker Institute for Climate System Research and the School of Agriculture, Policy and Development. The report is available from RASE.
New cocoa varieties needed to secure world's chocolate supply
March 2010
Researchers lead by Professor Paul Hadley in the School of Biological Sciences are leading the world's fight to ensure the sustainability of cocoa production. Pests and diseases already destroy about a third of potential cocoa production, and with climate change there will be a great threat to future supplies of cocoa. With funds for a new five year project to assess the threat climate change poses to cocoa, Reading is now in a unique position to examine all three main risks to the crop.
Brain stimulation and brain imaging
February 2010
A new BBSRC grant to in Psychology will further research activity in the Centre for Integrative Neuroscience and Neurodynamics (CINN). The three-year project, to the value of some £532,000, will combine novel and cutting edge techniques in brain stimulation and brain imaging to provide new insights into the role of parts of the brain's frontal lobes in regulating our emotions.
Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS), a method that allows parts of the brain to be temporarily perturbed, will be used to directly test the role the frontal lobes play in regulating subcortical parts of the brain that play a major role in generating human emotions. The long-term goal of the research is to develop a better understanding of basic emotion processes that can be applied to the study of clinical populations with depression and anxiety disorders. The aim is to develop new ways of diagnosing and treating such debilitating conditions, or preventing them from occurring in the first place.
Investment in facilities for research into the links between diet and chronic degenerative disease risk
January 2010
The Garfield Weston Foundation has awarded a sum of £100,000 to the Hugh Sinclair Nutrition Unit in the Department of Food and Nutritional Sciences. The Nutrition Unit has a world class reputation for research into the links between diet and the risk of chronic degenerative diseases, particularly cardiovascular disease.
Since the Unit was founded in 1995, it has grown from 3 to over 45 members and secured research funding of over £3 million last year. Recently, a dedicated Vascular Reactivity Suite has been established in the Nutrition Unit. This specialised unit will be used to determine the flexibility and stiffness of volunteers' blood vessels (vascular reactivity). These measures are now recognised as important risk markers for cardiovascular disease development. This new award, secured by a team led by Dr Julie Lovegrove, will be used to purchase specialised equipment for the non-invasive determination of vascular reactivity and blood pressure.
Research led by Professor Mark Pagel shows that new species arise due to random events, not natural selection
December 2009
Research led by Professor Mark Pagel of the School of Biological Sciences has found that the mechanism by which new species arise is probably not due to natural selection, but is caused by random events. These findings, published in the Journal Nature, provide a new interpretation of the Red Queen hypothesis, which is based on natural selection, and has previously been used to describe rates of occurrence of new species.
International award recognises prebiotic research by the Department of Food and Nutritional Sciences
December 2009
The Department of Food and Nutritional Sciences has spent eight years developing and bringing to market a new prebiotic which promotes gut health and general well-being. The product, Bimuno, won the 2009 European Food and Beverage New Product Innovation Award in December 2009.
Professor Glenn Gibson said: "This is one of the few examples where our initial concept has gone all the way through to a product sitting on a supermarket shelf. Our collaboration with Clasado Ltd., the project's commercial arm, has been very successful and we are delighted that the product has been so well-received."
Institute for Cardiovascular and Metabolic Research (ICMR) and British Heart Foundation
December 2009
Professor Jon Gibbins has been awarded £937,000 from the British Heart Foundation for a 5-year programme grant. The project, entitled 'The physiological importance and integration of receptor-mediated inhibitory mechanisms in platelets', will study how platelet responses are turned off or prevented - in order to explore new and better ways to prevent thrombosis (heart attacks and strokes).
Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition
November 2009
Dr Julie Lovegrove (Food and Nutritional Sciences) has been appointed by the Minister of State to serve as a member of the Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition (SACN). SACN is an advisory committee of independent experts that provides advice to the Food Standards Agency and the Department of Health, as well as other government agencies and departments. Its remit includes matters concerning nutrient content of individual foods, advice on diet and the nutritional status of people. Members are appointed as independent scientific experts on the basis of their specific skills and knowledge.
Agriculture has a great future says Sir Donald Curry
November 2009
'Agriculture has a great future' was Sir Donald Curry's conclusion when he delivered the School of Agriculture, Policy and Development's 26th Edith Mary Gayton Memorial Lecture to an audience of 230 farmers, agricultural scientists, consultants and students at the University of Reading on Monday 16 November 2009.
Sir Don Curry chaired the Policy Commission on the 'Future of Farming and Food' which reported to Government in January 2002 and informed government policy considerably. He then chaired a group that oversaw delivery of the government's Sustainable Farming and Food Strategy until 2009. The full text of his lecture, 'A sustainable future for farming and food in the UK: eight years on from the Policy Commission', describes the background to the 2002 review, its recommendations and implementation, and looks forward to the future.