Wetland environments will be exposed to mixtures of chemicals which can adversely affect the health of wetland species. Impacts on wetlands could alter in the future due to physico-chemical changes resulting from climate change. To protect wetlands from chemical exposure into the future, it is essential to understand how chemicals and climate change will interact to alter chemical risks. This PhD project will explore how climate change will affect the exposure of wetland species to mixtures of chemicals and the implications of this for chemical risk.
The project is supported by a CASE award with Reckitt, an international healthcare and consumer hygiene company. The student will develop an understanding of how climate change will affect the fate, behaviour, uptake and effects of chemical contaminants in wetland environments.
The student will gain hands on experience in environmental analytical chemistry (e.g. LC-MS-MS), environmental fate testing (e.g. sorption and persistence studies), the testing of the uptake of chemicals into species with different traits, modelling approaches for accumulation of chemical contaminants into organisms, and ecotoxicity assessment methods.
