Why do your PhD with us?

Matt Kent:: My name is Matt and I am investigating the effects of deforestation and drainage on peat swamp forests in Indonesia, specifically looking at the greenhouse gas emissions from channels draining those areas.

One of the best things about my project has been just the amount of time that I spent out in the field. So in the last three years I've spent about a year of that out in Indonesia, wading around swamp forests, being bitten by mosquitoes, but also learning a local language and really engaging with the culture. And, yeah, it's been an extraordinary experience.

During my time out in Indonesia, I really grew as a person. I think one of the main ways that was, was because I became incredibly independent. So over the course of a year I was coordinating people, where I was going to work, deciding the kind of research I was doing, and finding materials - and out in Indonesia those can be quite difficult, particularly in a rural area. But over a course of time I learned a language well enough and got to meet enough people that eventually I had I was hiring people to do to get drone footage of my sites over the forest, and it really helped me grow.

Laura George: Hi, my name is Laura and I'm doing a PhD on plant community assembly on soils fluctuating hydrology and looking at floodplain meadows - and I have some sites over in western Ireland as well.

At the OU (Open University) we have a few different facilities I've been using. So to get my seedlings going ready for the experiment, I've been using a controlled growth room environment where you can set temperature, and humidity, and the light, exactly how you want - which is great when you're trying to get seeds growing in November, December time. And then I've been basically growing them down here in the greenhouse all ready to plant out this March and ready to start experimenting.

So when I went out to do some preliminary analyses of my sites, I collected some soil samples because I basically wanted to look at how different they were in terms of nutrients, and pH which could really impact on the species diversity that's there, and because the main factor I want to look at is hydrology - I want to see how similar the other factors are. So I collected some soil samples, dried them, got them back over here, and then analyse them in the lab - extracting the phosphate and looking at the pH, which is then going to help me in my analysis further on.

Nikola: Hi, my name is Nik I'm a postgraduate research student at The Open University working on the real-time satellite-based volcano monitoring project.

My project is made of two parts, one is remote sensing the other part is volcanology. Training I received on fourier transfer infrared spectrometry to measure emissivity of volcanic rock samples. The results will be used for the remote sensing data verification.

Because my project is quite complex, I have three very capable supervisors – extremely knowledgeable researchers. Remote sensing - Fabrizio is absolutely brilliant and I can ask him anything about remote sensing, he is like an encyclopaedia, he knows everything. Hazel is my field supervisor she's a geophysicist, I absolutely loved working with her on Masaya volcano, Nicaragua, and I'm looking forward to see her again there or on any other volcano.

Stephen Blake, volcanologist, he is very knowledgeable about the rocks’ compositions, spectra, anything I need, I just give him a ring and he will basically tell me anything I need to know. Very, very good support from my supervisors and I'm absolutely brilliantly excited about the project and obviously happy with their support.