Staff

Frank Chambers
B.Sc. (Soton), Ph.D. (Wales)

Positions
Professor of Physical Geography

Contact
Email: fchambers@glos.ac.uk
Tel: +44 (0)1242 714677

I moved to Cheltenham in 1994 from Keele University having spent six years as Director of the Environmental Research Unit (latterly, 'Environmental Research Centre'). On arrival a priority was the establishment of the Centre for Environmental Change and Quaternary Research (CECQR), which was successfully launched in 1995 and which now serves within the Department of Natural and Social Sciences as a promotional marque for colleagues' research in climate change, palaeoenvironments and dating. I am particularly interested in the past record of climate and the forcing factors that drive natural climate changes, and comparing these with the scenarios of future climate.  One of the principal climate archives I investigate is that of peat bogs: their stratigraphy, microfossils and plant macrofossils (including ‘bog pine’ and ‘bog oak’), which testify to past abrupt climate changes during the current geological epoch (the Holocene).  A complementary interest is that of the vegetational history of bogs and moorlands, whether they have been influenced by human activity and by how much, and how they might be managed and conserved. In terms of ‘climate adaptation’, my primary interest is in rail and light-rail transport.

Undergraduate Teaching
EL226 Ice Age Earth
EL365 Climate Change
BIO/GEO327 Palaeoecology

Postgraduate Teaching
EM411 Environmental Science for Managers
RM497 Perspectives and Investigative Methods in Research and Consultancy

Other Activities
Co-ordinator of EC-funded ACCROTELM project (Abrupt Climate Changes Recorded Over The European Land Mass), 2003-6. EC Fifth Framework Programme, Energy and Environment - see photo.
Associate Editor, Biodiversity and Conservation
Associate Editor, The Holocene: an international, interdisciplinary journal of recent environmental change
Honorary Senior Research Fellow, Keele University

Research Interests
Late-Quaternary climatic change
Vegetational history; mire palaeoecology
Human impact on the landscape; Environmental Archaeology
Applied palaeoecology: habitat and landscape conservation
Climate Adaptation in rail and light-rail transport

Recent Publications

Climate History and Change

McClymont, E.L., Mauquoy, D., Yeloff, D., Broekens, P., van Geel, B., Charman, D.J., Pancost, R.D., Chambers, F.M. and Evershed, R.P.  (2008) The disappearance of Sphagnum imbricatum from Butterburn Flow, UK. The Holocene, 18; 991—1002.

Sillasoo, U., Mauquoy, D., Blundell, A., Charman, D., Blaauw, M., Daniell, J.R.G., Toms, P., Newberry, J., Chambers, F.M. and Karofeld, E. (2007) Peat multi-proxy data from Mannikjarve bog as indicators of late Holocene climate changes in Estonia. Boreas, 36, 20—37.

Chambers, F.M., Daniell, J.R.G. & Brain, S.A. (2007) Climate Change featuring the ACCROTELM project: dissemination of a European RTD project by film and DVD.  In Filho, W.L., Mannke, F. & Schmidt-Thome, P. (eds) Information, Communication and Education on Climate Change — European Perspectives.  Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Mein, 165—173.

Chambers, F.M., Mauquoy, D., Brain, S.A., Blaauw, M. & Daniell, J.R.G. (2007) Globally synchronous climate change 2800 years ago: Proxy data from peat in South America. Earth and Planetary Science Letters, 253, 439—444.

Sillasoo, U., Mauquoy, D., Blundell, A., Charman, D., Blaauw, M., Daniell, J.R.G., Toms, P., Newberry, J., Chambers, F.M. & Karofeld, E. (2007) Peat multi-proxy data from Mannikjarve bog as indicators of late Holocene climate changes in Estonia. Boreas, 36, 20—37.

Chambers, F.M. (2006) ACCROTELM: Abrupt Climate Changes Recorded Over The European Land Mass. Final Report to European Commission, Fifth Framework Contract no. EVK2-CT-2002-00166.  117 pp.

Hughes, P.D.M., Blundell, A., Charman, D.J., Bartlett, S., Daniell, J.R.G., Wojatschke, A. & Chambers, F.M.  (2006) A 9000 cal. year multi-proxy climate record from a bog in eastern Newfoundland: contributions of meltwater discharge and solar forcing. Quaternary Science Reviews. 25, 1208—1227.

Mauquoy, D., Blaauw, M., van Geel, B. Borromei, A., Quattrocchio, M. Chambers, F.M. & Possnert, G.  (2004) Late Holocene climatic changes in Tierra del Fuego based on multiproxy analyses of peat deposits.  Quaternary Research, 61, 148-158.

Chambers, F.M., Daniell, J.R.G., Hunt, J.B., Molloy, K. & O'Connell, M. (2004) Tephrostratigraphy of An Loch Mór, Inis Oírr, western Ireland: implications for Holocene tephrochronology in the northeastern Atlantic region. The Holocene 14, 703-720.

Chambers, F.M. & Charman, D.J. (2004) Holocene environmental change: contributions from the peatland archive.  The Holocene 14, 1-6.

Chambers, F.M. & Ogle, M. (2003) Climatic Change: Critical Concepts in the Environment, 4 volumes: Vol. 1: 'Global Warming', Carbon Dioxide and Climate Change;  Vol. 2: Natural Forcing Factors for Climate Change on Timescales 10-1 to 105 Years; Vol. 3: Natural Climate Change; Proxy Data; Vol. 4: Evaluating Recent and  Future Climate Change.  Routledge, London.

Barber, K.E., Chambers, F.M. and Maddy, D. (2003) Holocene palaeoclimates from peat stratigraphy: macrofossil proxy climate records from three oceanic raised bogs in Britain and Ireland.  Quaternary Science Reviews 22, 521-539.

Avsejs, L.A., Nott, C.J., Xie, S, Maddy, D., Chambers, F.M. & Evershed, R.P. (2002) 5-n-Alkylresorcinols as biomarkers of sedges in an ombrotrophic peat section.  Organic Geochemistry 33, 861-867.

Chambers, F.M. & Brain, S.A. (2002) Paradigm shifts in Late-Holocene climatology? The Holocene  12, 239-249.

Evershed, R.P., Volders, F.D.M., Xie, S., Nott, C.J., Avesjes, L.A., Maddy, D., Chambers, F.M., Gledhill, A. and Carter, J.F. (2001) Palaeoclimate records in compound-specific delta D values of lipid biomarkers in ombrotrophic peats.  Abstracts of Papers of the American Chemical Society 221, 118.

Chambers, F.M. & Blackford, J.J. (2001)  Mid- and Late-Holocene climatic changes: a test of periodicity and solar forcing in proxy-climate data from blanket peat bogs.  Journal of Quaternary Science 16, 329-338.

Xie, S., Nott, C.J., Avsejs, L.A., Volders, F., Maddy, D., Chambers, F.M., Gledhill, A., Carter, J.F. & Evershed, R.P. (2000) Palaeoclimate records in compound-specific dD values of a lipid biomarker in ombrotrophic peat.  Organic Geochemistry 31, 1053-1057.

Lageard, J.A., Thomas, P.A. & Chambers, F.M. (2000)  Using fire scars and growth release in subfossil Scots pine to reconstruct prehistoric fires. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 164, 87-99.

Nott, C.J., Xie, S., Avsejs, L.A., Maddy, D., Chambers, F.M. & Evershed, R.P. (2000) n-Alkane distributions in ombrotrophic mires as indicators of vegetation change related to climatic variation. Organic Geochemistry, 31, 231-235.

O'Connell, M., Molloy, K., Holmes. J.A., Jones, R., Saarinen, T., Roberts, M., McDermott, F., Hawkesworth, C.J., Barton, K., Leuenberger, M., Eicher, U., Chambers, F.M., Mauquoy, D., Hunt, J.B., van der Plicht, J., van Geel, B., Schettler, G., Dalton, C., Battarbee, R.W., Dörfler, W., Usinger, H. and Haas, J.N. (2000) Timing and Mechanisms of Holocene Climate Change in NW Europe (TIMECHS): Multidisciplinary investigations of calcareous sediments from Inis Oírr, Aran Islands, W. Ireland. Proceedings of the European Climate Science Conference, Vienna, 19-23rd October, 1998.

Vegetational History; Human Impact; Environmental Archaeology

Housley, R.A., Straker, V., Chambers, F.M. and Lageard, J.G.A.  (2007)An ecological context for the post-Roman archaeology of the Somerset Levels (South West England, UK).  Journal of Wetland Archaeology, 7, 1—22.

Innes, J., Blackford, J.J. & Chambers, F.M. (2007) Kreszschmaria deucha and the mid-Holocene Ulmus decline at Moel-y-Gerddi, North Wales, United Kingdom. Palynology, 30, 121—132.

Chambers, F.M. (2007) Environmental change and sustainability: lessons from the past.  In: Roberts, C. & Roberts, J. (eds) Greener by Degrees: Exploring Sustainability through Higher Education Curricula.  Geography Discipline Network, Cheltenham, 90—95.

Chambers, F.M. (2004) Pollen from Blackditch.  In G. Lambrick and T. Allen (eds) Gravelly Guy, Stanton Harcourt: the development of a prehistoric and Romano-British community. Thames Valley Landscapes Monograph 21, Oxford University School of Archaeology, Oxford, p. 420.

Mighall, T.M., Lageard, J.G.A., Chambers, F.M., Field, M.H. & Mahi, P. (2004) Mineral deficiency and the presence of Pinus sylvestris on mires during the mid- to late Holocene: palaeoecological data from Cadogan's Bog, Mizen Peninsula, Co. Cork, southwest Ireland.  The Holocene 14, 95-109.

Daniell, J.R.G. and Chambers, F.M. (2000) Report on Palynological Assessment of a Core from Framlingham Mere.  CECQR, GEMRU, CGCHE, Cheltenham 13 pp. (commissioned report).

Mighall, T., Chambers, F.M., Lanting, J.M., & O'Brien, W.F. (2000)  Prehistoric copper mining and its impact on vegetation: palaeoecological evidence from Mount Gabriel, Co Cork, south west Ireland.  In Nicholson, R.A., & O'Connor, T.P. (eds) People as Agents of Environmental Change, AEA Symposium 16, Oxbow Books, pp. 19-29.

Applied Palaeoecology and Conservation

Chambers, F.M., Mauquoy, D., Gent, A., Pearson, F., Daniell, J.R.G. and Jones, P.S. (2007) Palaeoecology of degraded blanket mire in South Wales: data to inform conservation management.  Biological Conservation, 137, 197—209.

Chambers, F.M., Mauquoy, D., Cloutman, E.W., Daniell, J.R.G. and. Jones, P.S.  (2007) Recent vegetation history of Drygarn Fawr (Elenydd SSSI), Cambrian Mountains, Wales: implications for conservation management of degraded blanket mires.  Biodiversity and Conservation 16, 2821-2846.

Chambers, F.M., Daniell, J.R.G., Mauquoy, D., Newberry, J. & Toms, P.S.  (2006) A Preliminary Examination of the Vegetation History of Moorland in Northern England.  Report on Project Contract VT014 to English Nature.  CECQR, Cheltenham, 55 pp.

Chambers, F.M. (2003) The environmental history of the bogs of the north-west lowlands: implications for conservation management.  Thorne & Hatfield Moors Papers, 6, 17-29.

Chambers, F.M. (2001) When are trees natural on bogs?  In: Whild, S., Meade, R. & Daniels, J. (eds) Management of Water and Trees on Raised Bogs, English Nature Research Reports 407, English Nature, Peterborough 21-25.

Chambers, F.M., Mauquoy, D., Pearson, F., Daniell, J.R.G., Gent, A. & Cook, C. (2001)  Recent Vegetational Change in Welsh Blanket Bogs: a palaeoecological appraisal.  Report for Countryside Council for Wales.  CECQR, GEMRU, Cheltenham (commissioned report).

Chambers, F.M. (2000)  Waen Rydd, Llanwrtyd Wells: a preliminary peat-stratigraphic analysis .  CCW East Area Report no. 13,  CECQR, GEMRU, CGCHE, Cheltenham 12 pp. (commissioned report).