I use techniques of palaeolimnology and aquatic ecology to study human and climate impacts on lakes over a range of timescales from weeks to millennia. I work on a broad range of lake ecosystems spanning arctic to temperate regions.

My arctic work is focused on:

• The role of arctic lakes in the carbon cycle including investigations from the Sisimiut and Disko Island region.
• Drivers of recent change (past 1000 years) in lakes from Southwest Greenland including nitrogen deposition and climate.
• Ontogeny of low Arctic lakes and relationships with Holocene climate change
• Palaeoclimate reconstruction using closed-basin saline lakes in the Kangerlussuaq region.

I am also interested in tracking and understanding how lakes respond to a variety of human-derived stressors including nutrient enrichment, land use change and atmospheric contamination. Recent projects include:

• Use of hyper-eutrophic ex-gravel pits as model ecosystems for shallow lake ecosystem functioning at Attenborough Nature Reserve
• Catchment-scale palaeolimnology of lakes in the Windermere catchment
• Use of chlorophyll and carotenoid pigments in combination with silicon isotopes to evaluate recent pollution on Lake Baikal
• Effects of catchment forestry on lake ecosystems in North-western Ireland
• Ecological effects of acid deposition in lakes upland lakes from Scotland
• Past work has also focused on lakes in the UK, Denmark, North American Prairies and the Canadian subarctic.

I specialize in pigment (chlorophyll and carotenoid) analysis using high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and diatom analysis, and manage a HPLC pigment analytical facility in the School of Geography.