PhD studentship for September 2026 Entry - Ecosystem Engineers: Developing Mechanistic Understanding into the Hydrological Impacts of Beaver Wetlands. NERC GW4+ DTP

Funding: For eligible students the studentship will cover home tuition fees plus an annual tax-free stipend.

About the Partnership

This project is one of a number that are in competition for funding from the NERC Great Western Four+ Doctoral Training Partnership (GW4+ DTP).  The GW4+ DTP consists of the Great Western Four alliance of the University of Bath, University of Bristol, Cardiff University and the University of Exeter plus five Research Organisation partners:  British Antarctic Survey, British Geological Survey, Centre for Ecology and Hydrology,  the Natural History Museum and Plymouth Marine Laboratory.  The partnership aims to provide a broad training in earth and environmental sciences, designed to train tomorrow’s leaders in earth and environmental science. For further details about the programme please see http://nercgw4plus.ac.uk/

For eligible successful applicants, the studentships comprises:

• An stipend for 3.5 years (currently £20,780 p.a. for 2026/27) in line with UK Research and Innovation rates
• Payment of university tuition fees
• The budget for project costs is £9,000 which can be used for computer, lab, and fieldwork costs necessary for you to conduct your research.
• There is also a conference budget of £2,000 and individual Training Budget of £1,000 for specialist training

Project Aims and Methods

The Eurasian beaver (Castor fiber) is being reintroduced to Great Britain after an absence of ~400 years. Beavers are well known as a keystone species and for their ecosystem engineering activities. Via the creation of structures such as dams, ponds and canals beavers can create extensive and complex wetlands. These wetlands have been shown to have a significant impact on hydrology, increasing water storage within the landscape and attenuating downstream flow regimes.  

This in turn has led to significant interest in whether beavers can act as a Nature-based Solution increasing resilience to the hydrological extremes of drought and flood. However, there remains a lack of detailed understanding into the mechanisms by which beaver engineered structures such as dams function. There is a direct need for this information from policy makers and managers seeking to incorporate beaver wetlands into management and policy.  

 Using a suite of approaches including hydrological and hydraulic models, flume experiments geospatial analysis and field validation this PhD will seek to gain novel understanding of the mechanisms by which beaver engineering changes river systems and flow regimes. 

Collaborative Partner 

The Environment Agency will provide: 

1) provision of technical staff time (~10 days, worth an in-kind contribution of approximately £6,200) 2) provision of data sets where possible 3) potential for industry application to make sure that research outcomes are useful to practitioners 4) provision of technical staff time from other Environment Agency teams to periodically contribute expertise to developing the PhD and its outputs at meetings 

Useful recruitment links:  

For information relating to the research project please contact the lead Supervisor via: a.k.puttock@exeter.ac.uk 

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