NEXUSS is a NERC / EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in the use of Smart and Autonomous Observing Systems (SAOS) to tackle major challenges in the environmental sciences where progress requires real-time, continuous, sustained and high-resolution observations. NEXUSS is an alliance of six leading science and engineering universities (University of Southampton, Heriot-Watt University and University of East Anglia) and research organisations (British Antarctic Survey, National Oceanography Centre and Scottish Association for Marine Science) that are in the vanguard of UK research and training excellence in the development and environmental application of SAOS. These partners undertake world-leading, multidisciplinary environmental science, and include the UK’s foremost engineers and physical scientists with access to some of the world’s best facilities in autonomy, novel platform and sensor development, miniaturisation, and data and image analysis. NEXUSS doctoral training is underpinned by a sustained stream of SAOS experiments across all of Earth’s environments, including the most remote and challenging - from the edges of volcanic plumes in the upper troposphere to the depths of the Antarctic Ice Sheet, and from major fluvial systems to the ocean abyss.
NEXUSS have recruited the final cohort of students and supports 46 PhD students over 3 cohorts. Students may undertake their research within one or several of the NEXUSS partners, and will be registered at one of the NEXUSS universities. Unique elements of NEXUSS include access to a full range of world-class SAOS platforms, sensors, development laboratories, and fieldwork experiments; and opportunities for placements at prestigious international research organisations and industrial and policy partners.