Emerging science and technology
What your money can do
- 2,000 donors each giving £25 will enable a major independent investigation of environmental risks that would be without corporate or governmental bias.
- 1,000 donors each giving £100 will support a three-year PhD scholarship for a bring young researcher who will improve risk assessment of natural hazards and other environmental dangers, including floods and earthquakes.
With the help of donations Bristol researchers across the disciplines of science, engineering and information technology are informing the direction of new technologies that will forge the future of our world.
Do you care about your planet?
As our population increases the world's resources are called upon to feed and water, clothe and house more and more people. Many communities are forced to live in areas that are at high risk of natural disasters such as earthquakes, floods and landslides; disasters that can claim hundreds of thousands of lives, particularly in the developing world, and halt the economic growth and development of a country for years.
At Bristol, earth and environmental researchers are working together to develop new methods to assess the environmental risks associated with natural hazards in order to lessen their impact on societies around the world. Research is prioritised in the areas of floods, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and landslides.
Flood
Bristol's multidisciplinary approach sees earth and environmental scientists working alongside engineers to produce accurate flood forecasting and warning tools in order to reduce flood risk to people, property and the environment at large.
Areas supported in 2011/12
- £15,000 is helping save lives in towns and cities in landslide prone areas of the Caribbean, Latin America and South Asia. Teams of scientists from Bristol’s Cabot Institute are empowering local communities by equipping them with the tools required to assess potential risk, so they can implement their own drainage solutions to reduce the impact of these water-driven disasters.
- Hundreds of A-level students across the South West are being inspired to consider higher education and encouraged to study science, thanks to gifts from alumni who are supporting a host of outreach schemes. Bristol’s Lab in a Lorry and ChemLabS programmes deliver hands-on workshops and innovative learning, using scientific tools that may not be available in schools, to bring science alive for our next generation of scientists.
- The Ski Club of Great Britain donated £4,000 to fund research into the biogeochemistry of snow in the French Alps. Bristol scientists studying microbes in snow will now investigate their role as nutrient recyclers for soil communities during the winter, and discover whether they are in part responsible for the acceleration of melting snow.