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Research
A multi-million pound programme of strategic research delivered over five years providing science and evidence to support policymakers and its partners. Informed by strong partnerships and the needs of a broad range of stakeholders. Science at the heart of society contributing to the health, wealth and wellbeing of Scotland and beyond.
Explore our research projects
The aim of the research within this RD is to improve understanding of issues around (re-) engagement of people with Scotland’s landscapes and natural environment. There are three key objectives set out for the research:
- Developing and applying a framework for understanding access to and engagement with natural landscapes
- Understanding opportunities to facilitate (re-)engagement with the land
- Examining linkages between environmental qualities and wellbeing
- Use of Outdoors & Greenspace
- 2016-2022
To improve understanding of the impacts of extensive land use and management on greenhouse gas dynamics The work will focus on the impacts of land use, including the agricultural intensification of extensive/upland soils and the management of semi-natural ecosystems such as peatlands and moorlands (wet and dry heathlands excluding areas of deep peat) on soil carbon stocks and greenhouse gas dynamics to reduce the uncertainty in our estimates of GHG uptake and release from these systems and to enhance our understanding of the impacts of forest-to-bog peatland restoration...
- Soils
- 2016-2022
To combine physical, chemical and biological approaches to characterise soil functions delivering essential ecosystem services. This will be done in the context of identifying the potential to promote beneficial functions of soils (e.g. water-holding capacity, resistance to erosion, storage of carbon, nutrient cycling) and to mitigate impacts on the environment (e.g. nutrient leaching and greenhouse gas emissions). The applied context that this research is directed toward is to identify management options (e.g.
- Soils
- 2016-2022
To support the sustainable use and management of Scotland’s soil resource. We will provide new and improved tools to predict how soil functions respond to land use, management and environmental pressures.
- Soils
- 2016-2022
To understand resilience of soils in Scottish semi-natural ecosystems. This research aims to understand the relationships among disturbance factors, soil properties, processes and soil functions for a range of important Scottish semi-natural ecosystems (peatland, moorland, woodland, grassland, alpine systems). This will enable assessments of the resilience of soil functions to changes in climate, environmental, and socio-economic factors.
- Soils
- 2016-2022
Sustainability of Healthy Diets: There is no single healthy, sustainable diet, since there are many different ways of achieving the dual dietary goals for health and environmental sustainability, and dietary intakes and the types of food chosen differ across different populations. This adds to the complexity of assessing and translating dietary advice to consumers. The research in this RD will provide a more comprehensive understanding of healthy sustainable diets in different sectors of the population and how these can be measured.
- Diet & Food Safety
- Human Nutrition
- 2016-2022
The Sustainable Soil and Water Management Deliverable has three broad aims. First, we will generate new knowledge to help enhance the sustainable use and management of soils and water in agricultural systems whilst reducing environmental impact. Work will be informed by the application of existing and novel models, soil management interventions, plant genotypes and soil quality indicators.
- Soils
- Water
- 2016-2022
The key aims and drivers of this research are:
- Improving Agricultural Practice
- 2016-2022
This RD will involve the development of tools and strategies to promote the increased use of data from across agricultural supply chains and industry networks, for management and feedback, in order to improve efficiency across the agri-food industry. We will focus on developing methodologies to help quantify and communicate the uncertainties resulting from pooling data across the supply chain. We will develop crop and livestock case studies building links with RDs 2.3.9 & 2.4.1 (barley) and WP2.2 & 2.4 (beef supply chains).
- Food Supply & Security
- 2016-2022
To understand how pressures such as problems arising from agricultural and urban land use and, increasingly, climate change affect the biophysical and ecological processes within our catchments. The focus of the research is on understanding how the biophysical and ecological processes within water bodies operate and contribute to the delivery of ecosystem function and health.
- Water
- 2016-2022