Profile: I use petrology and geochemistry to reconstruct environmental change in deep time – particularly episodes of rapid global warming. I also apply field-based sedimentology and stratigraphy to reconstruct the intrinsic behaviour and external controls (sea-level, climate and tectonic) on sedimentary systems. I have co-supervised four PhD students to completion, and am currently (co-) supervising two more. I have supervised seven Masters’ students, and 35 bachelors projects. Presently, my class, laboratory and field-based teaching focusses largely on Earth systems science, stratigraphy and sedimentology and field/mapping skills.

Areas of expertise: earth science, environmental science, climate change,  sediments, coal geology, organic geochemsitry.

Research and collaboration opportunities: I welcome applicants with and without funding to work in areas related to: sedimentology, stratigraphy, climate and environmental change in deep-time.

2016-present: Lecturer in Earth Science, University of Manchester, UK.

2012-16: Research Fellow in Stratigraphy, University of Manchester, UK.

2011-12: Lecturer in Geology, University of Plymouth, UK.

2022: Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, UK.

2010: PhD, Earth Science, University of Liverpool, UK.

2006: MSci (Class I), Earth Sciences, Imperial College, University of London, UK.

Internal service roles

2022-present: Admissions tutor, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences.

2017-present: Internal Examiner, PhD: Haitham Al-Ziayyir (2017), Jefferson Nwoko (2020), Zhongwei Zhao (2020), Hugues Bitault (2022), Ander Martinez Donate (2022).

I am currently coordinator of:

• 1st year Pembrokeshire Field Course (EART11300)
• 2nd year Sedimentary Rocks and Fossils (EART27201)

I also co-lecture:

• 1st year Understanding the Earth (EART11100)
• 2nd year Scotland Field Course (EART25201)
• 3rd year Geoenergy (EART34102)

I supervise a wide variety of field- and laboratory-based undergraduate and masters' projects in areas that align to my research.

My research falls into two main categories:

(1) developing and applying techniques in petrology and geochemistry to reconstruct high-resolution palaeoenvironmental change – particularly episodes of rapid global warming

(2) field-based sedimentology and stratigraphy to reconstruct the intrinsic behaviour and external controls (sea-level, climate and tectonic) on depositional sedimentary systems

Funded research projects

• 2021-23: CAPOC (Central Atlantic Paleo-Oceans and Climates) Offshore Energy Research Association of Nova Scotia (OERA), CAD212,000 (Co-I with Jonathan Redfern, Gregory Price and Luc Bulot).
• 2021-23: Constraining rates of peat accumulation and terrestrial mean annual temperature change at four Cretaceous-Palaeogene boundary sites in Canada.  National Environmental Isotope Facility (NERC), £34,176 (PI with Co-Is Sabine Lengger, Bart Van Dongen and Gregory Price).
• 2019-22: Testing the "Equable Earth" hypothesis. NERC Standard Grant, £582,000 (PI with Co-Is Sabine Lengger, Bart Van Dongen and Gregory Price).
• 2013-16: CASCADE (UK Carboniferous Shale Resource Assessment, Characterization and Development Evaluation). NERC Knowledge Exchange, £74,000 (Co-I with PI Kevin
  Taylor, and Co-Is Mike Bowman and Ernest Rutter).
• 2012-16: “Breathitt” Project (Intrinsic and extrinsic controls on fluvio-deltaic sand body geometries). Statoil AS, £48,000 (Co-I with PI Stephen Flint).
• 2011: Palaeoclimate record across the K-Pg boundary in the Western Interior of North America. Geological Society of London J. B. Tyrrell Fund and University of Plymouth Centre for Research in Earth Science, £5,000 (PI).

PhD students supervised

• Alfie Mackie (Liverpool; Liverpool; 2019-) Co-S with LS Christopher Stevenson (Liverpool) and Co-S Rob Duller (Liverpool), Ian Kane (Manchester) and Miquel Poyatos More (Barcelona). Bypass to deposition: architecture and processes in channel-lobe transition zones.
• Ashley Ayckbourne (NERC CDT; Manchester; 2018-). LS with Co-S Ian Kane and Kevin Taylor (Manchester), Matthew Watkinson (Plymouth) and Miquel Poyatos-More (Barcelona). Controls of mass wasting on sedimentation processes and heterogeneity in slope mudstone reservoirs.
• Peter Wooldridge (NERC DTP; Liverpool; 2017-21). Co-S with LS Rob Duller (Liverpool). Quantifying the role of floodplain peat in Carboniferous fluvial systems.
• Grant Cole (Plymouth; Plymouth University; 2016-19). Co-S with PS Matthew Watkinson (Plymouth) and Co-S Mark Anderson (Plymouth).Combined salt and extensional tectonic controls on facies distribution in the Early Cretaceous of the Maestrat Basin, Spain.
• Sarah Newport (Manchester; NERC DTP; 2014-19). Co-S with PS Kevin Taylor (Manchester) and Co-I Richard Worden (Liverpool). The Bowland Shale (UK): development of new sedimentological and diagenetic models for a Palaeozoic fine-grained succession.
• Madeleine Vickers (Plymouth; Plymouth University; 2014-18). Co-S with PS Gregory Price (Plymouth) and Co-S Matthew Watkinson (Plymouth). High latitude climate during the Cretaceous.

• Mohammed Chaanda (Plymouth; Plymouth; 2012-16). Co-S with PS Steve Grimes (Plymouth) and Co-S Gregory Price (Plymouth) and Mark Anderson (Plymouth). Cenozoic Terrestrial palaeoenvironmental change: an investigation of the of the Bovey and Petrockstowe Basin, south west UK.

MSc/MEarthSci students supervised

• Mason Lees (2020). (PS with Co-S Ian Kane). Characterisation of a distributive fluvial system: the Hyden Formation of the Breathitt Group, Appalachian Foreland Basin, USA. MSc.
• Kierran Smith (2019). (PS with Co-S Ian Kane). "When is a channel not a channel? The Eocene Fosado System, South Central Pyrenees". MEarthSci.
• Alec Barnett (2017) (PS with Co-S Ian Kane). Quantifying the palaeohydrology of giant fossil rivers in the Carboniferous of the Cnetral Appalachian basin, USA. MEarthSci.
• Kristian Eirhirhie (2016) “The Influence of Basement Structures and Oblique Foreland Development on Stratigraphic Patterns and Net to Gross in the Mid-Palaeozoic strata of the Central Appalacian Basin, Eastern Kentucky” (PS, with Co-S Rufus Brunt). MSc.
• Mutari Lawal (2016) “Numerical modelling of transverse sediment transport in foreland basins and implications for reservoir characterisation” (Co-S with PS Emma Finch). MSc.
• Sylverster Bamkole (2015): “Reservoir Characterisation of Upper Carboniferous fluvio-deltaic sand bodies and shale geometries in the Upper Breathitt Group, Central Appalachian Basin (Eastern Kentucky, USA) and an assessment of their role in conventional and unconventional petroleum systems” (PS, with Co-S Rufus Brunt). MSc.
• Laura Bennie (2014). “Facies model for river dominated, tidally influenced mouthbars and the implications for reservoir prone units: a case study fro, the Upper Carboniferous Breathitt Group of eastern Kentucky, USA” (PS, with Co-S Stephen Flint). MSc.