Dr Thorsten Balke
- Senior Lecturer in Physical Geography and Landscape Ecology (School of Geographical & Earth Sciences)
telephone:
01413305407
email:
Thorsten.Balke@glasgow.ac.uk
School of Geographical & Earth Sciences, Main Building East Quad., Room 409
Biography
PhD, Radboud University Nijmegen (The Netherlands)
Dipl. Geogr. (equiv. MSc), Leibniz University Hanover (Germany)
Research interests
As a landscape ecologist and geographer I am keen to improve process understanding of dynamic lanscapes and plant communities at various spatial and temporal scales .
My research group adopts a holistic and multidisciplinary approach to better understand the linkages between ecological, geomorphological/hydrological and anthropogenic processes in coastal and riparian landscapes. Our research output aims to help designing and implementing scalable Nature-based Solutions at land-water interfaces.
Key words:
- Biogeomorphology and biophysical interactions
- Mangroves, salt marshes, dunes, riparian floodplains
- Restoration Ecology
- Nature-based solutions
- Management of dynamic landscapes
- Ecosystem services
- Disturbance and seedling ecology
- Coastal environmental change
- Plant ecology and phenology
Grants
Obtained funding at Glasgow University (only >£5k):
2022
Co-I and WP2 lead on £10.2 million NERC funded project GALLANT (2022-2027) Delivering a Climate Resilient City through City-University Partnership: Glasgow as a Living Lab Accelerating Novel Transformation
PI on UoG 'Reinvigorating Research' grant £16.9k (2022) A plant functional trait approach to Nature-based Solutions
2021
PI on £5k Marine Alliance for Science & Technology for Scotland funded project (2021): How vulnerable are Scottish loch-head marshes to climate change?
2019
Co-I on £15.2m GCRF Living Deltas Hub (2019-2024)
Work Package 4: Develop delta-level interventions to respond to and mitigate against foreseeable coastal system tipping points
Co-I on Volkswagen Foundation (off-the-beaten-track) (€121k to UoG ) as part of a €409k project: Grafted Root Interaction Networks: Kropotkin’s garden: Networking beats competition in the struggle for limited resources (2019-2021)
2018
Carnegie Trust Research Incentive Grant (£9,883) Plant phenology and coastal dynamics in a changing climate (Scotland) (2018-2019)
Co-I on EU H2020 HYDRALAB+ access grant for a large scale flume experiment: Hydrodynamics at coastal wetland edges (2018)
UoG CoSE Rewards for Excellence (£10,000) Developing sensors for long-term monitoring of mechanical stress on intertidal plants (2018)
2017
Co-I on NERC/Newton Fund (£286k /£370k FEC contribution) as part of a £780k project: MOnitoring Mangrove ExteNT & Services (MOMENTS): What is controlling Tipping Points? (Indonesia, Vietnam: 2017-2020)
Supervision
Research Team:
Postdocs:
PhD candidates:
- Argemí Cierco, Marta
Nature based coastal protection: a predictive model for marsh ecosystem services - Ebeler, Laura
Development of an interdisciplinary decision support tool to inform mangrove restoration/conservation in large Asian deltas - Mallon, Jennifer
Calculating a blue carbon budget for contemporary Caribbean coral reefs under global climate change conditions - Stolpmann, Lea
Mangrove sediment carbon budgets along eroding and prograding coasts. - Zhang, Kangyong
Mangrove Biomass Estimation through Remote Sensing and Machine Learning based Approaches
Teaching
- Programme lead: Sustainable Water Environments MSc.
- Environmental history, hazards and urban physical geography, coastal processes (L2 Geography)
- Sediment laboratory course (L2 Geography)
- Biogeography of Europe (10 credit honours option)
- Nature Conservation in Europe (10 credit honours option)
- Residential field class (L2 Geography)
- Geographic thought (L3 Geography)
- Geography summer school (pre University)
- Ecology and Restoration (Sustainable Water Evironments MSc.)
- Managing Water Environments (Sustainable Water Evironments MSc.)
- Monitoring Water Environments (Sustainable Water Evironments MSc.)
- Global Challenges (Earth Futures MSc.)