The Centre for Ecology & Hydrology is the United Kingdom’s Centre of Excellence for land and freshwater science research, which gives us a key role in the debate on issues such as nature conservation, water resources, and environmental health.

Director of CEH Professor Patricia Nuttall, OBE “Much of our science is underpinned by our unique national and international survey capability which has enabled us to collect long-term data sets on all aspects of the natural environment.” ~Dr. Barnaby Smith, Press Officer

Our current research is directed towards six science areas, namely water, biodiversity, biogeochemistry, sustainable economies, climate change, and environmental informatics. Within these areas we carry out research addressing the strategic priorities of our parent body, the UK Natural Environment Research Council, and of key environmental policy makers and legislators including Government Departments and Agencies.

In the past five years the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology has focused its publication efforts on high-impact journals. We have been able to do this by reporting on the excellent science taking place across our key research areas in land and freshwater science. The Centre is unique because we work on environmental issues ranging in scale from the study of genes to global systems and call on the expertise of our 450 scientists specialised in many disciplines within terrestrial and freshwater biology, chemistry, and physics. Much of our science is underpinned by our unique national and international survey capability which has enabled us to collect long-term datasets on all aspects of the natural environment. This data is now realising its true potential as global concerns such as biodiversity, genetically modified crops, and climate change are increasingly in the public eye. Two examples of our datasets are the UK National Water Archive, which collates country-wide data on river flow, reservoirs, groundwater, and rainfall, and the UK Biological Records Centre, which brings together data on plant and invertebrate distributions, recorded by our own staff and volunteers across the UK.

The Centre for Ecology & Hydrology brings together interdisciplinary teams containing diverse researchers such as physicists, mathematicians, IT specialists, environmental scientists, and engineers. We have a wide range of field and laboratory facilities across the UK which allow our scientists the freedom to both pursue ‘blue skies’ research and to focus on the needs of society, policymakers, and stakeholders. Our size and status mean we take the lead on many European and global scale ecological and hydrological programmes. We therefore have a significant influence on the direction of research in the field of environment and ecology. Our datasets are used by many scientists throughout the UK and beyond to underpin their research, and our scientists are in constant demand to speak to the public and the media about the important work they undertake.

Moving forward, the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology will focus on creating solutions to a range of pressing environmental problems ranging from local conflicts to global issues. Key to this process will be harnessing the full power of our unique datasets cataloguing hydrological and ecological changes through our new programme in Environmental Informatics. We will continue to work with our existing partners across the world and to add new ones. These new partners will include groups of socio-economists and will support further interaction with the people who use our science on a day-to-day basis to manage the environment.