Dr Hazel Beaumont

I am a Senior Lecturer in Geology/Geoscience at UWE Bristol. My current research focuses on microplastics and understanding how they travel through and where they are stored within fluvial systems. To understand this work I have undertaken experimental flume tests and I am in the process of collecting field data to further this understanding and to determine if the experimental data matches the field data. Prior to this my research focused on Cretaceous fluvial system in Rajasthan and understanding how the climate and active tectonic influenced the fluvial channel style and implications for diagenesis.

Funding:

For my research I have received the following funding:

1. Vice Chancellors Early Career Researcher, University of the West of England; Summer 2021 for a project called: Where and how are the microplastic stored locations in fluvial systems? I received £14,947.
2. Early Career Researcher, International Association of Sedimentology; Summer 2021 for a project titled: Do microplastics affect bedform migration in rivers? I received €2429.
3. Daniel Pigeon Fund, Geological Society of London; Summer 2020. For a project titled: Provenance of Lower Cretaceous Sandstones within the West Indian Rift System of India and the Lower and Middle Indus basins of Pakistan. I received £1280.

At UWE I teach sedimentary processes and environments, the basics of geology to allow geographers and environmental scientists to understand the past, tectonic and hazards. As well as this I help student to understand extraction for resources and environmental assessments. I love fieldwork and therefore help students learn by taking them into the field on most modules I teach on.

I'm a coordinator for Geoscience for the Future: https://geoscienceforthefuture.com/ which I am very passionate about. At Geoscience for the Future our goal is to change the record and show how Geoscience gives us tools to tackle the biggest challenges facing our world – from fighting the climate crisis, to managing resources, to protecting communities from hazards. I was the secretary for the British Sedimentological Research Group (BSRG) from December 2019 until December 2021.

Before taking up my post here I was a teaching fellow at the University of Birmingham where I undertook teaching across all UG levels and across multiple geography and geology programmes. While undertaking this post I was completing my Ph.D. in sedimentary geology at Keele University. I also hold an MSc in Structural Geology and Geophysics and a BSc in Geology with Geography.