The BBSRC-funded South West Biosciences Doctoral Training Partnership (SWBio DTP) involves a partnership of world-renown universities, research institutes and industry across the South West and Wales.
This partnership represents a distinctive group of bioscientists, with established international, national and regional networks, and widely recognised research excellence.
We aim to provide students with outstanding interdisciplinary research training within the following themes, underpinned by transformative technologies:
These are growth areas of the biosciences and for which there will be considerable future demand.
The award:
This project is one of a number that are in competition for funding from the South West Biosciences Doctoral Training Partnership (SWBio DTP).
Programme Overview
You will be recruited to a broad, interdisciplinary project, supported by a multidisciplinary supervisory team, with many cross-institutional projects available. There are also opportunities to:
• apply your research in an industrial setting (DTP CASE studentships).
• undertake research jointly with our core and associate partners (Standard DTP studentships with an
associatepartner).
• work with other national/international researchers.
• undertake fieldwork.
Project Description
Given climate change, future UK farming systems need to be both sustainable and resilient to increasing risks from abiotic (e.g., floods), biotic (e.g., pests), political (e.g., Ukraine war) and epidemiological (e.g., Covid‐19) stresses. Agriculture accounts for 70% of land in the UK with negative environmental impacts including those from greenhouse gases, water sediment and nutrient pollution, and the loss of terrestrial and aquatic ecology. Pressures on productivity include reduced accessibility to fresh water and intensified competition for land for non‐food production and urbanisation. Given these challenges, farming and land use decisions need to be timely, robustly informed by science and supported by policy ‐ decisions that are typically made via digital tools informed by measurement.
Measuring agricultural processes at the farm‐scale is ideal: this project will help evolve the North Wyke Farm Platform (https://www.rothamsted.ac.uk/north‐wyke‐farm‐platform) (NWFP), a globally unique research facility, as a case study. For the past 12 years, research informed by the NWFP open datasets has helped identify sustainable and net zero land management strategies. Platform farms are heavily monitored to provide systems‐scale data on soils, crops, livestock, biodiversity, water/gaseous emissions, farm management and weather, and advances in digital science have been central to the on‐going development of the NWFP Digital Twin (DT). A DT simulates virtual‐world realisations of real farms allowing the generation of ‘what if’ scenarios to inform decision making.
This project will focus on the design element of the farm‐scale monitoring platform, with an overall objective to direct the continued delivery of timely, coherent, and relevant data for its DT and related digital projects. The project will consist of interlinked objectives that integrate core design concepts for optimal sampling at spatial, temporal and spatio‐temporal scales with options for designs that are multi‐variate, multi‐scale and/or multi‐objective in nature.
The successful student will work as part of a team of world class researchers in the fields of agricultural digital science. The project will run alongside wider programmes of work researching different aspects of sustainability and resilience in UK agriculture. The student will have the opportunity to explore both basic and applied aspects of farm‐scale experimental design in the context of mitigating against climate change. The project will focus on the use and development of modern design tools applied to real and simulated system datasets to ultimately contribute to climate‐smart land use, both in the UK and globally.
How to apply
Please be aware you will be asked to upload the following documents:
- CV
- Letter of application outlining your academic interests, prior research experience and reasons for wishing to undertake the project. Please indicate your preferred project choice if applying for multiple BBSRC SWBio DTP projects.
- Transcript(s) giving full details of subjects studied and grades/marks obtained. This should be an interim transcript if you are still studying.
- Two academic referees - see information below about references.
- If you are not a national of a majority English-speaking country you will need to submit evidence of your proficiency in English (see entry requirements above)
The closing date for applications is midnight on Monday, 5 December 2022. Interviews will be held between 1st and 15th February 2023.
If you have any general enquiries about the application process please email [Email Address Removed].
Project-specific queries should be directed to the primary supervisor.
For further information including entry requirements and academic criteria, and to submit and application please visit - https://www.exeter.ac.uk/study/funding/award/?id=4631
Selection Process:
Please note, the studentship selection process will take place in two stages:
For further information please go to - https://www.swbio.ac.uk/programme/selection-process/
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