Lee Bryant is a Senior Lecturer in the Infrastructure, Geotechnical and Water Engineering (IGWE) group within the Architecture and Civil Engineering Dept. She is also co-director of the Centre for Climate Adaptation and Environment Research (CAER) within the Faculty of Engineering. Her research interests include biogeochemistry and cross-media mass transfer with a link to sustainable geoenvironmental engineering.

Research

Lee’s research focuses on using applied approaches to improve sustainable water supplies and ecosystem health, building on water quality and public health perspectives. Her expertise and research focus on biogeochemical cycling in aquatic systems with specialization in the mass transport of oxygen, metals and nutrients within the water column and at the sediment-water interface within both marine and freshwater systems. She typically uses a largely field-based approach to her research and has a solid background in using in-situ sampling paired with microsensor and voltammetric technology to monitor and model processes influencing water quality.

Her research group is currently focusing on:

1. The influence of engineered aeration on water and sediment quality within drinking-water-supply reservoirs, with specific focus on manganese and algal blooms
2. Effects of seasonal stratification and water levels on benthic oxygen dynamics
3. Evaluating crop quality within the context of soil and water pollution at urban agriculture sites (in Sierra Leone and the UK)
4. Characterising the potential of community-led phytoremediation as a plant-driven mitigation strategy
5. Monitoring greenhouse-gas emissions from lakes and reservoirs

Interested in supervising students studying:

• Biogeochemical cycling in lakes and reservoirs
• Sustainable catchment and freshwater management
• Using oxygenation and other engineered methods to improve water quality
• Field-scale investigations of phytoremediation and urban agriculture
• Geoenvironmental engineering