Research

Antimicrobials are often the last line of defence in protecting animal health and maintaining animal welfare standards. This project is providing a deeper understanding of the consequences of antimicrobial use in livestock production to extend the useful lifespan of individual antimicrobials and reduce risk to public health and the wider environment.

The aim of this project is to characterise and quantify the flow of antimicrobial resistance genes within and from livestock holdings to the wider environment and human population, to inform antimicrobial stewardship and optimal use, and human risk via the food chain. Using a study site with pig, beef, poultry and sheep holdings, we are generating top-down descriptions of antimicrobial resistance patterns found in the environment and matching them with bottom-up hypothesis testing with experimental characterisation of the processes driving antimicrobial resistance gene flow through the system. The resultant data is feeding into antimicrobial resistance risk analyses as well as simulation modelling studies of the population dynamics of antimicrobial resistance genes in livestock and their linked environments.

We use a holistic framework that combines data from epidemiology, applied agricultural economics, and behavioural science in a multi-disciplinary approach to biosecurity in three case studies. This enables a better understanding of: farmers, their context, and the factors that influence their behaviour and choices; the impact of different biosecurity choices on disease burdens; the potential for influencing decisions through communicating disease predictions; barriers to uptake of biosecurity practices, which of these can be influenced, and what might be effective in incentivising uptake by different types of farmers in different contexts.

This project is assessing and enhancing water-related ecosystem services of Nature-Based Solutions in catchments. We explore how NBS can work across multiple sectors and scales to achieve transformative change.

This project investigates the role of Scottish livestock and their environments in transmission of important foodborne pathogens, Toxoplasma gondii and Campylobacter spp., to humans.  

This project provides new approaches for reducing greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) from agriculture and land use in Scotland, establishes a database of management activities contributing to the mitigation of GHG emissions, investigate new approaches to GHG mitigation, and assess the potential for land management activities to contribute to carbon sequestration. Engagement with stakeholders will explore barriers to uptake of mitigation measures.

Burning biomass (for example, logs) for domestic heating can release fine particles, causing respiratory and cardiovascular disease. This project addresses three questions: how much domestic biomass burning takes place in Scotland, how much pollution does this cause, and does it impair human health? These questions are addressed using novel measurement methods as well as modelling.

Ammonia from livestock farming harms air quality but receives less attention than greenhouse gases (GHG).  We describe mitigation measures that can be taken now, providing tools to support adoption. We check trade-offs between measures targeting ammonia and those targeting GHG, filling knowledge gaps. Replacing models by measurements should improve monitoring, so we test emerging technologies for measuring farm ammonia emissions.

This project aims to investigate microbial risks carried by wildlife species whose distribution and abundance is affected by climate change.

This project evaluates the impact of dietary health interventions for improving Scotland's diet and nutrition, and investigates whether and how their impact varies over time and across demographic groups. It also investigates potential unintended consequences of implementing the dietary interventions (for example, increased health inequalities).