News from the ECG, 2021 Chair's report
Rowena Fletcher-Wood
Freelance science communicator
rowena.fletcherwood@gmail.com
Freelance science communicator
rowena.fletcherwood@gmail.com
In 2021, the Environmental Chemistry Group Committee celebrated its 200th committee meeting, 25 years of Bulletins, and published its first Diversity, Accessibility and Inclusivity statement. Due to the pandemic, and the subsequent move to online events, the committee is considering more hybrid events in future.
The ECG is pleased to welcome three new committee members: Dr Pablo Campo-Moreno (Cranfield University), who investigates the fate and transport of nutrients and contaminants of emerging concern in water, soils, and sediments; Dr Stephanie Powley (British American Tobacco), an analytical chemist with a background in marine environmental chemistry. She has an interest in outreach and is supporting the ECG website; Irene O’Callaghan (University College Cork) is a postgraduate researcher focusing on fates and impacts of emerging contaminants and trace metals on aquatic benthic macroinvertebrates – she is joining the ECG Bulletin editorial team.
In 2022, we will say goodbye to three current committee members: Dr Laura Newsome, whose invaluable contribution has included setting up, populating and maintaining the ECG website, and contributing to our 2019 Distinguished Guest Lecture on radioactive waste disposal. Dr Roger Reeve moves on after serving an incredible 15 years on the committee and contributing to numerous events, in particular, the Analysis of Complex Matrices series, and ongoing collaborations with the Water Science Forum and Separation Science Group. A longstanding editor, he has contributed to 27 Bulletin issues. Dr Tom Sizmur also leaves after 7 years. After serving as Chair, he is our Vice Chair and Bulletin commissioning editor, and has contributed to a wide scope of ECG events, including #EnvChem: Chemistry of the Whole Environment, and Early Careers Researchers meetings.
The committee attended various online events and engaged with the scientific literature to learn about citizen science, diversity, event evaluation, and specialist environmental chemistry topics, and disseminated our findings in Bulletin reports and book reviews.
Our virtual events included #EnvChem2021: Chemistry of the Whole Environment on 25th June, a forum for researchers working in environmental chemistry and ecotoxicology, featuring keynote speakers Dr Helena Gomes (University of Nottingham) and Dr Zhugen Yang (Cranfield University), who discussed resource recovery from waste materials and paper-based wastewater epidemiological diagnosis, respectively (see report p. 10). Our Wastewater Based Epidemiology Continuing Professional Development Webinar on 9th September hosted Professor Barbara Kasprzyk Hordern (University of Bath) and Dr Alwyn Hart (Environment Agency), who updated the membership on recent advances in these tools, using COVID-19 as a case study. On 17th September, we ran Chemistry for the Environment, a joint meeting with the RSC Biotechnology Group which focussed on effecting technological changes in the next ten years that will benefit the environment, and address the challenges scientists face (see report pp. 7-8). Our delayed 2021 AGM was hosted on 12th October, alongside a webinar on Molecular biogeochemistry of soil organic matter: Analytical challenges, integrative approaches, and future perspectives by Professor Myrna Simpson (University of Toronto). On the 9th June, we co-sponsored Plastics, From Cradle to Grave – and Resurrection II, an event led by the Society of Chemical Industry (SCI), which built on our event in 2019, discussing challenges in the sampling, analysis and future use of plastics (p. 9).
On 2nd March, we took part in the #RSCPoster Twitter Conference, an annual event that unites the scientific community through sharing research, networking, and debate. Featured poster contributors Juliana Vidal and Paul Kimani later contributed Early Career Briefs on nanostructures of exfoliated biochar and titanium dioxide microspheres (July 2021, pp. 7-10).
Our in-person events included IF Oxford: an outreach event where 6 volunteers ran 6 COVID-safe demonstrations over 2 days to 250-300 members of the public, mostly families (see p. 6). Our featured topics were ocean acidification, microplastic separation and analysis, and air quality monitoring, featuring a citizen science project with Abingdon schools.
Forthcoming events in 2022 include our postponed Distinguished Guest Lecture Disposable Attitude: Electronics in the Environment on 10th March at Burlington House with Mr Steve Cottle (Edwards EMS Ltd) as the Distinguished Guest lecturer.
The ECG is pleased to welcome three new committee members: Dr Pablo Campo-Moreno (Cranfield University), who investigates the fate and transport of nutrients and contaminants of emerging concern in water, soils, and sediments; Dr Stephanie Powley (British American Tobacco), an analytical chemist with a background in marine environmental chemistry. She has an interest in outreach and is supporting the ECG website; Irene O’Callaghan (University College Cork) is a postgraduate researcher focusing on fates and impacts of emerging contaminants and trace metals on aquatic benthic macroinvertebrates – she is joining the ECG Bulletin editorial team.
In 2022, we will say goodbye to three current committee members: Dr Laura Newsome, whose invaluable contribution has included setting up, populating and maintaining the ECG website, and contributing to our 2019 Distinguished Guest Lecture on radioactive waste disposal. Dr Roger Reeve moves on after serving an incredible 15 years on the committee and contributing to numerous events, in particular, the Analysis of Complex Matrices series, and ongoing collaborations with the Water Science Forum and Separation Science Group. A longstanding editor, he has contributed to 27 Bulletin issues. Dr Tom Sizmur also leaves after 7 years. After serving as Chair, he is our Vice Chair and Bulletin commissioning editor, and has contributed to a wide scope of ECG events, including #EnvChem: Chemistry of the Whole Environment, and Early Careers Researchers meetings.
The committee attended various online events and engaged with the scientific literature to learn about citizen science, diversity, event evaluation, and specialist environmental chemistry topics, and disseminated our findings in Bulletin reports and book reviews.
Our virtual events included #EnvChem2021: Chemistry of the Whole Environment on 25th June, a forum for researchers working in environmental chemistry and ecotoxicology, featuring keynote speakers Dr Helena Gomes (University of Nottingham) and Dr Zhugen Yang (Cranfield University), who discussed resource recovery from waste materials and paper-based wastewater epidemiological diagnosis, respectively (see report p. 10). Our Wastewater Based Epidemiology Continuing Professional Development Webinar on 9th September hosted Professor Barbara Kasprzyk Hordern (University of Bath) and Dr Alwyn Hart (Environment Agency), who updated the membership on recent advances in these tools, using COVID-19 as a case study. On 17th September, we ran Chemistry for the Environment, a joint meeting with the RSC Biotechnology Group which focussed on effecting technological changes in the next ten years that will benefit the environment, and address the challenges scientists face (see report pp. 7-8). Our delayed 2021 AGM was hosted on 12th October, alongside a webinar on Molecular biogeochemistry of soil organic matter: Analytical challenges, integrative approaches, and future perspectives by Professor Myrna Simpson (University of Toronto). On the 9th June, we co-sponsored Plastics, From Cradle to Grave – and Resurrection II, an event led by the Society of Chemical Industry (SCI), which built on our event in 2019, discussing challenges in the sampling, analysis and future use of plastics (p. 9).
On 2nd March, we took part in the #RSCPoster Twitter Conference, an annual event that unites the scientific community through sharing research, networking, and debate. Featured poster contributors Juliana Vidal and Paul Kimani later contributed Early Career Briefs on nanostructures of exfoliated biochar and titanium dioxide microspheres (July 2021, pp. 7-10).
Our in-person events included IF Oxford: an outreach event where 6 volunteers ran 6 COVID-safe demonstrations over 2 days to 250-300 members of the public, mostly families (see p. 6). Our featured topics were ocean acidification, microplastic separation and analysis, and air quality monitoring, featuring a citizen science project with Abingdon schools.
Forthcoming events in 2022 include our postponed Distinguished Guest Lecture Disposable Attitude: Electronics in the Environment on 10th March at Burlington House with Mr Steve Cottle (Edwards EMS Ltd) as the Distinguished Guest lecturer.
