Spatiotemporal variation of bacterial hazards in the Akaki catchment, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Molecular markers link Vibrio cholerae hazards in the Akaki catchment to human sewage pollution. 0.6-20% of fecal coliforms in the rivers of the catchment had ESBL producing antibiotic resistance traits. Hazards were highest in the dry season when river water is used for irrigation. Read our paper in Science of the Total Environment.

Metal exposure of residents in the Akaki catchment

Sometimes you find the opposite of your hypothesis. Despite of the river pollution from domestic, industrial, and commercial activities in Addis Ababa, higher metal levels were found in nails of residents living in the upstream rather than the downstream area of the Akaki river catchment. Excellent work led by Dr Dessie and colleagues in Ethiopia.

Woman washing cloths in the Leghendai

If universities want to hit climate targets, they should use their land for carbon offsetting

Universities could use their massive land holdings to offset carbon in their own backyard. My Piece in The Conversation is based on Jiaqian Wang’s work. The figure panel a) below shows how arable land stores the least amount of carbon per surface area, while panel b) shows that most of the current land use at Newcastle University’s Nafferton and Cockle Park farms is arable. Panel c) shows how medieval slash and burn agriculture created a boundary between agricultural land and woodland at Nafferton farm, that leaves trees only in the most inaccessible places such as Whittle Dene.