The growing number of extreme weather events threatens humankind's efforts to ensure global food security, eradicate poverty and achieve fair, sustainable societies. There is consequently a need to identify and improve staple food crop varieties that are more tolerant of climate extremes, such as drought and heat stress. The project will use hyperspectral imaging and genomics methods to screen the response to water deficit stress of common bean landraces from the Andes, one of their centres of origin. Common beans are the primary source of proteins and essential nutrients for a third of the world population as well as useful forage and soil fertilisers. The project will help to informing bean breeding to safeguard future bean yields under climate change.

Tropospheric ozone is an important air pollutant, harmful to human health, agricultural crops and vegetation. It is the main precursor to the atmospheric oxidants which initiate the degradation of most reactive gases emitted to the atmosphere, and is an important greenhouse gas in its own right. As a consequence of this central role in atmospheric chemistry and air pollution, the capacity to understand, predict and manage tropospheric ozone levels is a key goal for atmospheric science research. This goal is hard to achieve, as ozone is a secondary pollutant, formed in the atmosphere from the complex oxidation of VOCs in the presence of NOx and sunlight, and the timescale of ozone production is such that a combination of in situ chemical processes, deposition and transport govern ozone levels. Uncertainties in all of these factors affect the accuracy of numerical models used to predict current and future ozone levels, and so hinder development of optimal air quality policies to mitigate ozone exposure. Here, we will address this problem by measuring the local chemical ozone production rate, and (for the first time) perform measurements of the response of the local atmospheric ozone production rate to NOx and VOC levels - directly determining the ozone production regime. We will achieve this aim by building upon an existing instrument for the measurement of atmospheric ozone production rates (funded through a NERC Technology Proof-of-Concept grant, and deployed in the recent ClearfLo "Clean Air for London" NERC Urban Atmospheric Science programme). In addition to directly measuring ozone production, by perturbing the ambient chemical conditions (for example, through addition of NOx or VOCs to the sampled airflow), and measuring the effect of this change upon the measured ozone production rate, the ozone control regime (extent of NOx vs VOC limitation) may be directly determined. Within this project, we will develop our existing ozone production instrument to include this capability, and validate the measurements, through comparison with ozone production from VOC oxidation in a large simulation chamber, and by measurement of the key oxidant OH radicals, and their precursors, within the system. We will then apply the instrument to compare the measured ozone production rates with those calculated using other observational and model approaches, and to characterise the ozone control regime, in two contrasting environments: In the outflow of a European megacity (at Weybourne Atmospheric Observatory, WAO, in the UK), and in a rural continental location (at Hohenpeissenberg, HPB, in southern Germany). At WAO, we will compare the measured ozone production rate with that calculated through co-located measurements of HO2 and RO2 radicals (using a newly developed approach to distinguish between these closely related species), and with that simulated using a constrained photochemical box model. We will compare the NOx-dependence of the ozone production rate with that predicted using indicator approaches, based upon observations of other chemical species. At HPB, we will focus upon the VOC-dependence of the ozone production rate, and assess the error in model predictions of ozone production, which arise from the presence of unmeasured VOCs. The project will develop and demonstrate a new measurement approach, and apply this to improve our understanding of a fundamental aspect of atmospheric chemical processing. Future applications have considerable potential both to support atmospheric science research, but also as an important air quality tool, alongside existing measurement and modelling approaches, to inform the most effective emission controls to reduce ozone production in a given location. In the context of global crop yield reductions arising from ozone exposure of 7 - 12 % (wheat), 6 - 16 % (soybean) and 3 - 4 % (rice), this is an important societal as well as scientific goal.

Many globally important crops are polyploids, for example cotton, sugar cane, potato and wheat. However, the regulation of polyploid genomes is complicated because there are multiple copies of most genes. We have limited knowledge about the molecular mechanisms regulating these gene copies. In this project we will take advantage of the recent revolution in wheat genomics to study how multiple gene copies are regulated polyploid genomes using wheat as a model system. The most widely grown wheat is hexaploid bread wheat (Triticum aestivum) which has on average three highly similar copies of every gene (homoeologs). The A, B and D homoeologs of each gene are typically >95% identical within coding sequences and can be functionally redundant, i.e. if one homoeolog is mutated no phenotypic effect will be observed due to compensation by the other homoeologs. However, we do not know how common functional redundancy is between homoeologs or understand the molecular mechanisms controlling redundancy. This lack of knowledge limits our ability to control phenotype and hence improve polyploid crops. Homoeolog expression levels were studied as a first step towards understanding homoeolog redundancy and it was found that 30% of wheat genes show different expression levels between the A, B and D homoeologs suggesting that the homoeologs may be non-redundant. The hypothesis is that the ability to manipulate the relative expression levels of homoeologs may provide a route to reduce functional redundancy and more easily alter phenotypes in wheat. Therefore, this project will investigate the mechanisms that control homoeolog expression levels including epigenetic and nonsense-mediate decay pathways, and their effects on phenotype.

Research and policy discussions on tropical forest ecosystem services are currently happening in two disjoint spheres. Ecologists and economists are in conversation to develop data and models for quantifying and monetising ecosystem services. On the other hand, political ecologists, political economists and sociologists are studying the implications of changes in forest rights, institutions and governance mechanisms for forest conservation and the well-being of the poor. In terms of policy, the former group is recommending market-based approaches, while the latter is recommending a rights-based approach. The disconnect is from both sides and at several levels. Environmental economists tend to assume away the critical importance of institutions and power as a determinant of forest condition, market prices and benefit distribution, whilst rights- and justice-focussed researchers may neglect the full range of ecological services and their importance to non-local stakeholders. Ecologists emphasise the multiplicity of benefits from forests, while political economists point to tradeoffs between them. We contend that these two analytical and policy perspectives must be reconciled if sustainable and pro-poor governance of forest ecosystems and their services is to be achieved. We propose to address this challenge in this project. Forest-related decision-making in India reflects this lack of integration and rigour. While the Supreme Court has imposed a net present value charge on forest conversion, upstream (hilly) states are demanding payments from downstream ones for forest conservation. Both are using data and methods that are weak, to say the least. While the Ministry of Environment and Forests is eagerly looking to carbon markets to bring in new financial flows, activists and local communities, while struggling to get a landmark forest rights law implemented, are questioning the Ministry's initiatives without any consultation or reference to rights. They are also unclear about how (or under what conditions) the new rights will actually improve livelihoods and affect ecosystem services. This study will use two critical concepts-tradeoffs and institutions-as an approach to nuancing and bridging the conversations. It will develop an understanding of the biophysical flows of ecosystem services, their variation by management regime and distribution across stakeholders and within them for poorer households, the tradeoffs involved in modifying forest management regimes, and the role played by institutions in shaping who benefits and how. The project will also seek to develop rigorous assessment methods and tools for rapidly assessing different management scenarios in different political-economic contexts. The study will be implemented in India, in two regions-Western Ghats and eastern central India (Orissa state in particular)--with contrasting ecological and social characteristics and forest histories. We will use comparisons between adjacent state managed 'command and control' (for timber / biodiversity) and rights based management sites within each region. We will attempt to consider the full range of ecosystem services, including forest products, hydrological services, and carbon sequestration and biodiversity. We will seek to disaggregate the FES value chains and the distribution of benefits to different users along the value chain, and to highlight policy recommendations that increase benefits to the poor. Findings will be highly policy relevant and will feed into policy debates over forest governance and rights. Findings and the methodological innovations they are based on will also be of relevance to forest policy globally ... Stakeholder engagement is seen as essential and will be achieved through 3 cycles of workshops in which 'learning groups' comprised of multiple stakeholders will contribute into and develop a sense of understanding for the ESPA issues, our innovative project and the findings.