The Department of Geography has an international reputation for research on land-use/land-cover changes and locational analysis. This includes research within the rural, urban and transport sectors, both in Europe and tropical regions. The Department aims to develop an interdisciplinary approach to its research that brings together a variety of methods in both economic and physical geography. Thus, the research of the Department has focused on the analysis, modelling and monitoring of spatiallydistributed land surface processes. The academic staff of the Department contribute to international science programmes including the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP), the International Human Dimensions Programme (IHDP), the Land Use/Cover Change initiative (LUCC), the Intergovenmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), as well as leading national and international research projects funded by the European Commission, FAO or ESA.
The Department has four research laboratories:
a) physical geography,
b) remote sensing,
c) urban and economic geography, and
d) environmental change and GIS.

The Laboratory of Environmental Change and GIS (Head, Prof. Mark Rounsevell) undertakes research on land use change in both the rural and urban environments within Europe. This research is based on the development of models that integrate socio-economic and biophysical processes, linked to suitable GIS technology. Model development and application is used both to further understanding of land use processes and process interaction, as well as to evaluate the impact of different environmental change drivers (e.g. climate or policy change) on the structure and spatial distribution of land use.

RESEARCH TEAM: Mark Rounsevell, Isabelle Reginster, Eva Kamphorst