News
Scientists study Israeli waters
Researchers from Biological Sciences recently returned from an
international workshop in Israel where they conducted important
investigations and forged valuable links with Israeli colleagues.
Coral reef in Israeli waters
The small Essex team, led by Dr David Suggett, were delegates at the
Group for Aquatic Productivity (GAP) workshop. Held every three to four
years, the GAP meetings aim to discuss and test the latest concepts and
techniques in marine science. This year’s event was the largest GAP
meeting with 60 attendees from 15 countries.
The meeting was held in Eilat, southern Israel, which uniquely has many
different ecosystems including coral reefs, open ocean, seagrass beds and
hyper-saline ponds. Each ecosystem have very specialised photosynthetic
organisms and are known to be regulated by harsh environmental conditions
in different ways. The aim was to examine how these alternative ecosystems
photosynthetically transform light energy into fixed organic carbon and so
determine their respective roles in sequestering CO2
from the atmosphere.
After a series of initial talks, teams went on to the water to conduct
various projects. The Essex team took part in the open ocean and coral
reef studies. The ocean project involved spending three days on board a
research vessel taking water samples and setting up experiments to examine
the response of different components of the microbial community to
nutrient additions. The coral group revisited classic studies using modern
techniques to re-test long established concepts. The results of the
research activities will be published in 2009 in the journal Aquatic
Microbial Ecology.
The team on board the research boat
Dr Suggett said: ‘A major bonus of the meeting was forging new
collaborations between our team and those at the Inter-University of
Israel Marine Sciences. Links have been made to conduct experiments at
Eliat as part of our on-going projects investigating how corals and
nitrogen fixing bacteria will respond to more acid oceans as the earth’s
CO2 levels increase. Plans are also
underway to bring Israeli researchers to Essex.’
Essex climbs the tables
Essex has moved up to 25th place in The Good University Guide,
published in The Independent newspaper, and is second behind
Cambridge in the East of England table.
The University also climbed 13 places in The Guardian league
tables to 36th position.
In both tables Essex outranks a number of competitors including the
universities of East Anglia and Reading, as well as large universities
such as Sheffield, Newcastle and Liverpool.
Essex also features in the top 20 in eight subject tables in The
Independent, and a further four in The Guardian.
Vice-Chancellor Professor Colin Riordan welcomed the improved rankings
and said: ‘We are certainly not complacent - there are many different
indicators of a University’s quality and league tables can oversimplify a
complex picture. We are striving to make further improvements to the
student experience at Essex, and I hope these will be reflected in our
future league table position.’
The Independent table ranks 113 UK universities, using nine
measures including student satisfaction, research assessment, good honours
degrees, graduate prospects, facilities and academic services spending and
staff:student ratios. Essex climbs from 34th place last year.
The Guardian, which ranks 117 institutions, does not include
research ratings and its seven measures include a value added score
comparing students’ degree results with their entry qualifications.
Subjects featuring in the top 20 are:
The Independent: Politics (10th); Linguistics (10th); Drama,
Dance and Cinematics (13th); Electrical and Electronic Engineering (14th);
Sociology (16th); Hospitality, Leisure, Recreation, Sport and Tourism
(17th); Economics (19th) and Psychology (19th).
The Guardian: Sports Science (5th); Electronic and Electrical
Engineering (8th); American Studies (10th) and Politics (18th).
Multicultural Essex inspires student
A student inspired by the multiculturalism of the University has won
first prize in a competition to design an image for a canvas bag.
To coincide with the launch of the myLife ePortfolio earlier in the
year, the Learning and Teaching Unit (LTU), in collaboration with the
Students’ Union, ran the Illustrate your Life competition. Entrants were
required to design an image, on a promotional canvas bag, that represented
their life and experiences at Essex.
Simona Szakacs, a PhD student in the Department of Sociology, took the
top prize of £250 with runners-up Katri Tenhola, exchange student in the
Department of History, and Miranda Forth, second year BA in Law and Human
Rights, receiving £50 prizes.
The winning entry by Simona Szakacs
Simona explained what inspired her design which
features multiple eyes: ‘My life at Essex has been marked by intercultural
encounters and cross-cultural exchange. The contact with so many students
coming from different countries has genuinely fed my sheer fascination
with the world. To me, this meant I have started to actually “see” the
world with more than one pair of eyes.
The competition was judged by a panel which included the
Vice-Chancellor and staff from the Students’ Union, the Arts Office, the
LTU and the Printing Centre.
Also in the printed May edition of Wyvern:
- Children's rights in police custody
- Library receives medical collection
- Speed dating scores successful match
- School's on for summer
- Caring for Somali refugees
- Home to roost
- Boost to business
- Tropical texts
- Picnic in the park
- Physics reunited
