Wallace Coffee Talks - 17th March 2020

Wallace Coffee Talks - Spring 2020

17th March - 12pm - Zoology Museum

Fancy a cup of coffee or tea and learning more about the researchers at Swansea university? Come join us at the Wallace coffee talks: an informal seminar series where students, staff and others related to Swansea university speak about their research or personal interests.

Ellis Larcombe

Developing a cleaner fish sperm bank

Control of the parasitic salmon louse, Lepeophtheirus salmonis is perhaps the biggest issue in Atlantic salmon aquaculture. In recent years lumpfish, Cyclopterus lumpus, have been successfully used as cleaner fish to biologically control the costly salmon lice problem. However, production of lumpfish needs to upscale to reach the industry demand. The production cycle of lumpfish has not been fully closed and, therefore, relies on harvesting of sexually mature brood stock, and artificial insemination. This supply of broodstock is not always consistent, which can be problematic for production and harvested gametes can go to waste. Cryopreservation of the sperm can help solve these issues. This talk will present the current state of lumpfish sperm cryopreservation, along with my plans to optimise the methodology and make it more suitable for commercial lumpfish production. 

@LarcombeEllis

@csar_ace

Ruth Callaway 

What is driving Swansea Bay? Learning from the past to prepare for the future   

Urbanised coastal environments like Swansea Bay have undergone dramatic change in the past centuries. There are two urban centres, Swansea and Port Talbot, the main wastewater outfall is located in the centre of the inner bay and shipping lanes are dredged to two docks and three rivers. A regularly dredged tidal harbour is located next to Port Talbot Steelworks. All dredge spoils are discarded at a disposal site in the outer Swansea Bay. The bay is designated a Heavily Modified Waterbody under the Water Framework Directive (WFD) because of coastal defence infrastructure dividing land and sea and in recent years it was proposed to build a tidal lagoon in Swansea Bay to convert the vast tidal range into electricity. Understanding vulnerabilities of coastal ecosystems facing anthropogenic use is precondition for management decisions and development planning. This can be challenging in areas with multiple activities affecting different faunal communities. In this talk I will discuss long and short-term ecological changes in Swansea Bay. What changed in the past centuries, what during the past decades? How do we assess these changes and what are the scientific challenges? What lessons can we learn for other urban area? And what does this mean for future research? The talk will give an overview of research carried out for a number of projects such as SEACAMS, KESS and Welsh Crucible, and will also highlight interdisciplinary work.