In the wake of COP26, the South West is to play a lead role in a major new initiative aimed at sustainably managing the UK's coasts and seas.
The Centre for Doctoral Training in Sustainable Management of UK Marine Resources (SuMMeR CDT) aims to deliver the next generation of researchers, solution providers and practitioners who will sustainably manage our marine resources.
Supported by £2.2million in funding from the Natural Environment Research Council, part of UK Research and Innovation, the Centre will train almost 50 interdisciplinary PhD students over the next seven years.
The SuMMeR CDT is being coordinated by some of the UK's foremost marine science organisations. Led by the University of Plymouth, its core hosting partners include the University of Exeter, Plymouth Marine Laboratory, the Marine Biological Association as well as the universities of Bangor in Wales, and Heriot-Watt in Scotland.
They will in turn work with collaborative partners - at the Zoological Society of London, the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (UKCEH), and the universities of Portsmouth and the West of England - on subjects ranging from marine and social sciences to law, health, education and economics.
Together they will cover existing and emerging topics of local, national and global importance, from enabling biodiversity gains and delivering Net Zero, to enhancing coastal protection and supporting coastal communities, and from pioneering marine technology to fostering a sustainable marine economy.
The initiative is also being supported by more than 45 associate partners from research, industry, government and third sectors, giving students the opportunity to understand current marine resource management issues from multiple perspectives.
The first cohort of 16 students aligned to the SuMMeR CDT will start their courses in the autumn of 2022.
Centre for Doctoral Training in Sustainable Management of UK Marine Resources (CDT SuMMeR)
The Centre for Doctoral Training SuMMeR has been designed to deliver the next generation of innovative transdisciplinary engaged researchers, solution providers and practitioners needed to support governmental and non-governmental sectors to ensure sustainable management of our marine resources.
World leaders
We are ranked the number one university globally for the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goal number 14: life below water.
The award recognises the quality of our marine research and teaching as well as our efforts to reduce the impact of campus activities on the marine environment. The Times Higher Education Impact Rankings are the only global performance tables that assess universities against the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Times Higher Education Impact Rankings 2021: life below water
The research highlighted here is funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC)
NERC is the UK's main agency for funding and managing research, training and knowledge exchange in the environmental sciences. Our work covers the full range of atmospheric, Earth, biological, terrestrial and aquatic science, from the deep oceans to the upper atmosphere and from the poles to the equator. We coordinate some of the world's most exciting research projects, tackling major environmental issues such as climate change, environmental influences on human health, the genetic make-up of life on Earth, and much more.
NERC is part of UK Research & Innovation, a non-departmental public body funded by a grant-in-aid from the UK government. www.ukri.org
