Scottish Centre for Ecology and the Natural Environment

 

SCENE provides state-of-the-art facilities for a diverse range of people including teaching staff, support staff, researchers from many different disciplines and students, both undergraduate and postgraduate.

 SCENE Staff

Director
Prof Colin Adams
Deputy Director
Dr Barbara Helm

Research interests in the area of behavioural ecology.

This includes programmes of investigation into:

  • the biology of the Arctic charr
  • the early evolutionary processes leading to polymorphism in fishes
  • the impact of new species introductions into freshwater systems
  • life-history strategies in salmonid fishes

Research interests in the study of wild and captive birds to understand:

  • physiology
  • behaviour
  • evolutionary ecology
  • life-history strategies of coping with geophysical cycles

 

 

SCENE Support Staff

IBIS Project Staff 

David Fettes‌ - Operations Manager

Responsible for the day to day management of technical operations at SCENE
Andrew Smith‌ - Project Manager

Personal webpage                                                                                                                                          

Rona Brennan‌ - B‌ursar

Manages the domestic arrangem‌ents for visiting field courses and provides administration at SCENE
LindsayWilson‌ - P‌roject Administrator

                                                                                                                

 

Stuart Wilson‌ - Technician

Maintains facilities and provides technical support for courses and research
Dr Jennifer Dodd‌ - Research Assistant

 

 

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Hannah Taylor - Project Clerical Officer
   

Research & Teaching Staff

Dr David Bailey

Ecology and physiology of marine animals in particular the effects of‌ climate on

  • the abundance
  • body size
  • behaviour of deep-ocean and polar species.‌‌                                                                                                                                                       
Dr Roman Biek
  • population ecology and genetics
  • ecology and evolution of infectious diseases in wild animal populations
  • spatial epidemiology and evolution of wildlife rabies
  • parasites as host population markers
Dr Kathryn Elmer
  • speciation
  • adaptive radiation
  • ecological genomics
  • phenotypic plasticity
  • ecological adaptation
  • ichthyology
  • herpetology
  • adaptation to environmental change
Dr Heather Ferguson
  • Behavioural and evolutionary ecology of parasites and their insect vectors
  • population dynamics
Dr Shaun Killen
  • physiology and behavioural ecology of marine and freshwater fishes
  • effects of environmental stress on animal behaviour
  • scaling of metabolic rate with body size in organisms and its relationship to ecology
Dr Dominic McCafferty
  • biophysical ecologist studying the physiological and behavioural adaptations of animals foraging in cold and aquatic environments
Dr Ross MacLeod
  • Individual starvation-predation risk trade-off strategies and their links to population dynamics
  • Using animal behaviours to assess impacts of environmental change
  • Biodiversity monitoring for conservation and the development of novel monitoring techniques
  • Species richness distribution patterns & processes
  • Inter-specific variation in male reproductive investment in testes mass and the evolution of extreme testes size
Prof. Neil B. Metcalfe 
  • life-history strategies of salmonids and birds
  • factors influencing the breeding success of the Pied Flycatcher
  • the factors influencing nocturnalism in fishes
  • predator avoidance strategies in fishes
Dr Kevin Murphy
  • Functional ecology of vegetation
Dr Ruedi G. Nager
  • Environmental constraints on parental investment in birds
  • Energetic consequences of nest structure and microclimate in the common eider
  • Instrumentation for measuring environmental conditions and parental state in birds
Dr Kevin Parsons
  • genetic and developmental basis of craniofacial shape
  • role of divergent natural selection for determining phenotypes
  • integration and modularity
  • phenotypic plasticity
Prof Susan Waldron

Susan's work is largely interdisciplinary and includes collaboration with scientists in ecology, botany, environmental science and hydrology.  Research interests include:‌

  • Biogeochemical cycles, especially carbon and within aquatic systems
  • Applications of stable isotope analyses to biogeochemical cycling
  • Stoichiometry of natural systems. Continuous data-logging of water chemistry parameters

Honorary Staff

Prof. Felicity A. Huntingford - Honorary Emeritus Professor of Functional Ecology
  • the functional significance and biological consequences of aggression in fishes and crustacea life-history strategies in fishes
  • the role of body reserves in reproductive strategies
Dr Colin Bean - Honorary Senior Lecturer

Colin has a wide range of interests in the conservation of freshwater systems. He currently works for Scottish Natural Heritage but lectures at SCENE on conservation issues, and jointly supervises graduate students.
Dr Andy Burrows - Researcher and Honorary Lecturer 

Fisheries Biologist for the Loch Lomond Fisheries Trust.  Andy conducts research into the links between habitat and population density of fish and applied fish biology.
Prof. John E. Thorpe - Visiting Professor
John has had a long association with SCENE. He has collaborated on, supervised and conducted a number of projects carried out there, on the nature and proximate causes of life-history variation, primarily with Atlantic salmon but more recently with lepidoptera species.

Prof. Peter S. Maitland - Visiting Professor

Peter has a wide range of collaborative research links with the University of Glasgow and SCENE.
His wide range of research interests include:‌

  • the biology of freshwater systems
  • conservation of fish
  • the management of freshwater systems

Recent Visiting Researchers

Arnaud (Archie) Corbarieu - Montpellier, France

E-mail - arnaud.corbarieu@club-internet.fr 

Prof. Rune Knudsen, Tromso, Norway

E-mail - Rune.Knudsen@nfh.uit.no 

Dr Kate Arnold

  • UV-reflectant and fluorescent signaling
  • Sex allocation in birds‌
  • Cooperative breeding
  • Evolution of sociality
  • Comparative analyses of avian mating systems
  • Maternal effects
  • Differential allocation