Environmental Research Institute

• ERI’s researchers are working to improve our understanding of how human activities are changing the balance of biologically active elements between the atmosphere, land and ocean. Such changes have strong implications for the regulation of the earth climate and for the structure and functioning of ecosystems. The fist biogeochemical system under study consists of three interconnected aquatic systems in the Highlands of Scotland, (i) an organic rich, river catchment, (ii) a black water estuary and (iii) a coastal zone receiving inputs from the adjacent catchment. The second system consists of tropical coral reefs and their associated ecosystems. These ecosystems are involved in the cycling of biogeochemically active compounds and the production of metabolites whose exact composition is a function of stress factors. The third system is the interface between atmosphere and open ocean where planktonic organisms such as coccolithophorids are major producers of sulphur-bearing gases that can affect air quality and even influence the climate.

• Elucidate sources and fate of dissolved organic matter and trace metals in the coastal zone.
• Improve our understanding of the reciprocal interactions between coral reefs and their environment.
• Quantifying biogenic trace gas release in the open ocean.

• Soil organic carbon: inventory, composition and interactions with living biomass
• Nutrient status of fresh water bodies and coastal waters
• Metalbinding properties of natural organic matter
• Marine ecology of coral reefs
• Ocean-atmosphere exchange of climatically important biogases

• Prof. Stuart Gibb
• Dr. François L. L. Muller
• Dr. Martina Maria Burtscher
• Dr. Kathleen McDougall
• Dr. Angela Squier

Current Students

• Espen Platou
• Ms. Silvia Batchelli

Graduated Students

• Bjørn Bleie

Publications:

• Johnson M, Liss PS, Bell T, Gibb SW, Lesworth T, Baker AR, Biswas KF, Hind A, Woodward MS, Jickells T (2008) Field observations of the ocean-atmosphere exchange of ammonia: fundamental importance of temperature as revealed by a comparison of high and low latitudes. Global Biogeochemical Cycles, in press.
• Johnson MT, Sanders R, Avgoustidi V, Lucas MI, Brown L, Hansell D, Moore CM, Gibb SW, Liss PS, Jickells TD (2007) Ammonium accumulation during a silicate limited diatom bloom indicates the potential for ammonia emission events. Marine Chemistry 106: 63-75.
  doi:10.1016/j.marchem.2006.09.006
• McDougall, K.E., Gibb, S.W., Boyd, K.G. & Brown, B.E. (2006) ‘Chlorophyll-like’ compounds as novel biomarkers of stress in corals. Marine Ecology Progress Series, 35, 137-144.
• Naqvi SWA, Bange HW, Gibb SW, Goyet C, Hatton AD, Upstill-Goddard RC (2005) Biogeochemical ocean-atmosphere transfers in the Arabian Sea. Progress in Oceanography 65: 116-144.
• Muller FLL, Larsen A, Stedmon CA, Søndergaard M, 2005. Interactions between algal-bacterial populations and trace metals in fjord surface waters during a nutrient-stimulated summer bloom. Limnology and Oceanography 50: 1855-1871.
• Gibb SW, Hatton AD (2004) The occurrence and distribution of trimethylamine-N-oxide in Antarctic coastal waters. Marine Chemistry 91: 65-75.
• Muller FLL, Jacquet S, Wilson WH, 2003. Biological factors regulating the chemical speciation of Cu, Zn and Mn under different nutrient regimes in a marine mesocosm experiment. Limnology and Oceanography 48: 2289-2302.
• Steinke M, Malin G, Gibb SW, Burkill PH (2002) Vertical and temporal variability of DMSP lyase activity in a coccolithophorid bloom in the northern North Sea. Deep Sea Research II 49: 3001-3016.
• Tankéré SPC, Bourne DG, Muller FLL, Torsvik V (2002) Microenvironments and microbial community structure in sediments. Environmental Microbiology 4: 97-105.
• Joint I, and 27 authors including Gibb SW (2001) Pelagic production at the Celtic Sea shelf break. Deep Sea Research II 48: 3049-3081.
• Gibb SW, Barlow RG, Cummings DG, Mantoura RFC, Irigoien X (2001) Pigment chemotaxonomy of the northeastern Atlantic. Deep Sea Research II 48: 795-823.
• Muller FLL, Gulin SB, Kalvøy Ǻ (2001) Chemical speciation of copper and zinc in surface waters of the wstern Black Sea. Marine Chemistry 76: 233-251.

Current:

• Soil organic carbon: inventory, composition and interactions with living biomass - Weather induced changes in stream chemistry and reactive aluminium exports from a blanket bog catchment (François Muller, in collaboration with the RSPB)
• Metal-binding properties of natural organic matter - Riverine inputs of colloidal organic matter to the coastal ocean off the north coast of Scotland (Silvia Batchelli and François Muller)
• Marine ecology of coral reefs - Biomarkers of environmental stress in warm water corals (Kathleen McDougall, in collaboration with the University of Newcastle, UK, and Haereticus Environmental Laboratory, USA)