Research group

Coastal Communities

View of Blackpool Tower, beach and coastal defences on a sunny day.

Coastal Communities SIG focuses on bringing together researchers and non-academic stakeholders to tackle challenges facing coastal communities. 

About

We are an interdisciplinary group of researchers interested in tackling real-world challenges in coastal communities. We aim to improve understanding and capacity to adapt to these challenges by bringing together those researchers, policymakers, and other stakeholders who are affected, interested and/or involved in coastal communities. Through creating a forum for discussion, sharing methods and best practice, and doing research together, we can improve understanding and management of the challenges that coastal communities face, ranging from the health impacts of air pollution to social effects of climate change-driven coastal change.  

On an annual basis, the Coastal Communities SIG will host three formal meetings to:

  • Bring together researchers from across all faculties and institutes at the University of Southampton to discuss coastal communities research and identify opportunities for interdisciplinary collaboration. This will support the sustainability of existing working relationships, create space to build new partnerships, and facilitate interdisciplinary coastal communities bid development.
  • Invite University of Southampton researchers and external stakeholders to participate in a methods/best practice workshop, focusing on a cross-cutting approach. This will provide opportunity for researchers and other stakeholders to meet and upskill in methods/best practice they may not have encountered within their own discipline or working practice.
  • Hold a lunchtime forum with academic, policy and practitioners invited both as guest speakers and participants to learn from and network with each other. This will enable researchers and other stakeholders to share leading-edge research and practice and facilitate new collaborative partners for future research.

The Coastal Communities SIG invites those from within and outside of the University of Southampton to join the group. We welcome new ideas for events, trainings, speakers.

To find out more about the Digital Oceans Special Interest Group and what we do, get in touch with group champions Sien Van Der Plank and Lareb Dean.

Join the SMMI Community to sign up to this group and our other special interest groups.

People, projects and publications

People

Dr Seyedvahid Vakili

Research Fellow

Research interests

  • Sustainable shipping;
  • Net zero emissions;
  • Alternative fuels for (maritime) net zero emissions;
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Dr Sheida Afshan PhD, FICE, MIStructE, CEng, FHEA

Associate Professor

Research interests

  • High performance metallic materials and structures for applications in infrastructure and energy sectors
  • Experimental and numerical investigation of structural materials and components
  • Metallic materials for liquid hydrogen (LH2) fuel storage and transportation

Accepting applications from PhD students

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Dr Sien Van Der Plank PhD

Senior Research Fellow

Research interests

  • Multi-scale analysis using mixed methods of coastal flood risk management across policy domains, organisational stakeholders and households.
  • Risk attitudes and behaviours to the natural environment in relation to perceived, expected and experienced social and physical changes.
  • Mixed methods analysis of the form and evolution of stakeholder perceptions toward mining, expected impacts of mining, and experiences of consultation process.

Accepting applications from PhD students

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Professor Simon Blainey PhD, FRGS, FHEA, MCIHT, CMILT

Professor of Sustainable Transport

Research interests

  • Rail demand and operations modelling
  • GIS and transport
  • Transport decision support systems

Accepting applications from PhD students

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Dr Simon Boxall

Principal Teaching Fellow
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Professor Simon Cox

Head of Department

Research interests

  • My research focusses on computational tools, technologies and platforms and how they enable interdisciplinary problems to be solved in engineering and science.His team in the Computational Engineering and Design Group is applying and developing high performance and cloud computing in a variety of collaborative interdisciplinary computational science and engineering projects. These include:
  • High Performance and novel Computing SystemsCloud Computing and commercial distributed computing - which led to a spin out companyApplied computational algorithms Computational electromagnetics– which led to the formation of a spin-off company.New algorithms such as meshless methods and fast solvers.Data Management Simon is also Director of the Microsoft Institute for High Performance computing where he demonstrates why, where and how current and future Microsoft tools and technologies can be exploited to enable engineering and scientific research to deliver faster, cheaper and better results.
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Professor Stephanie Jones

Professor of Literature and Law

Research interests

  • Literature and Law
  • Postcolonial and decolonial studies
  • Marine and maritime literatures
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Professor Stephen Boyd BEng, MSc, PhD

Professor

Research interests

  • Maritime Composites
  • Experimental and Numerical mechanics
  • Non-contact full-field techniques for validation of numerical models
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Professor Stephen Roberts

Professor of Geology
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Professor Stephen Turnock

Head of School

Research interests

  • His fluid dynamics expertise lies in the synthesis of analytical, experimental and computational methods for a diverse range of applications. Examples of such work are in the development of a patented integrated tidal energy generator (winner of The Engineers’ Energy Sector Innovation award 2008), supervision of the students who designed Amy Williams’ Gold medal winning bob skeleton sled (winner of The Engineer’s Sport Technology Innovation award in 2010) and with continued support for Gold medal success in 2014 and 2018, academic supervisor for the Delphin Autonomous underwater vehicle (winner of the SAUC-E competition in 2007).
  • He has acted as a consultant to diverse organisations including NOC, Speedo, Shell Shipping, BAEsystems, Rolls Royce, dstl, QinetiQ, and WS Atkins.
  • Expertise: Future Fuels for Shipping; Maritime Robotics and Autonomy; Rudder, hydrofoil, and control surface design; Unsteady race simulation for kayak, rowing and sailing; Hull-propeller-rudder interaction; Ship added resistance and manoeuvring in waves; Underwater noise prediction using CFD; Experimental techniques for use of wave/tow tank testing; Tidal turbines, wave energy and offshore wind turbine design; Wind turbine array power prediction; Hydrogen fuel cells for hybrid ship propulsion; Hydrodynamics of swimming assessment by pool based test techniques and using CFD.

Accepting applications from PhD students

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Related research institutes, centres and groups

Related research institutes, centres and groups

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Enquiries

If you're interested in joining us or collaborating, get in touch with the Southampton Marine and Maritime Institute.