PhD in Geography (physical) | PhD geology and geosciences

Physical geography at Brighton is underpinned by a wide range of expertise across the geosciences, and has been an important and impactful research focus at the University of Brighton for more than 40 years.

Our expert research staff work across the spectrum of physical geography, bringing real-world impact through laboratory and field methods in, for example, geology and earth science, geophysics, geochemistry, mineralogy, geospatial technologies, environmental data and remote sensing.

Our recent work has included investigating the causes and timing of Phanerozoic Great Oxidation Event, understanding carbonate mineralogy for CO2 sequestration applications and helping understand the origin of the Stonehenge Sarsen stones. Our researchers have undertaken landform analysis and modelling to examine, for example, how the world’s largest rivers shape their landscapes, or the impacts of iceberg scour on the sea-bed. We are also working to unravel evidence of past environmental change, from analyses of climate discourses in historical documents, to research at the interface of geomorphology and archaeology. Research has been applied in the characterisation of hydrocarbon reservoirs, in estuarine management, in the engineering of managed retreat sites, and to extend rainfall and tropical cyclone records in India and southern Africa.

Our graduate students from the physical geography PhD have gone on to a variety of different roles following the successful completion of their research. These include academic posts as lecturers and postdoctoral research assistants at Brighton and elsewhere, plus research roles in, for example, the mining industry. Many have gone on to management positions in related areas such as environmental consultancy.

Contact an expert in this field

Successful applicants have invariably had support with their application from one of our academics. We suggest you approach a suitable academic staff member with relevant research interests before progressing with your application.

Details of PhD in geography (physical), geosciences and geology at the University of Brighton

We provide physical geography PhD students with opportunities to work on projects that draw on a range of geosciences and a history of globally influential projects. Our PhD students take an active role in a range of intellectual and social activities around the university and have a rewarding base at the research Centre for Environment and Society. This allows interdisciplinary interests to thrive, networks to build, and gives opportunities to present work in progress. Researchers within the research centre are engaged in work across a wide range of topic areas including research which straddles traditional disciplinary boundaries into, for example, archaeology, ecology or engineering. We believe that this interdisciplinary focus provides our students with an appreciation of real-world problems, and ensures that they are highly employable.

We welcome applications for research degrees in geography, geology and geosciences that align to some current areas of focus but are also interested in wider proposals that match supervisory interests:

Applied geochemistry
Dryland geomorphology
Critical metal deposits
Records of environmental change
Environmental fate of metals
Fluvial geomorphology
Sediment dynamics in fluvial, estuarine and coastal environments
Glacial and periglacial geomorphology
Hydrogeology
Petrology
Mineral deposit genesis
Remote sensing
Reconstructing quaternary environments

Research supervision for your physical geography and geoscience PhD programme

You will benefit from research supervision comprising two or maximum three members of academic staff. Depending on your research specialism one of those supervisors may be from another school, another research institution, or an external partner.

You will identify your potential supervisor from the early stages of application and they will usually then support you throughout your programme of study, helping you carry out your research interests, guiding your learning of rigorous research methods and preparing you for the next stage of your career.

You should consider the staff listed below and contact one of them with a short draft research proposal identifying your suitability for supervision from that person's research specialism.

Research skills and research training

The independent research programme is balanced and enhanced with a range of support from our academic community. You and your fellow postgraduate researchers will have the opportunity to attend and present at regular seminar sessions with guests from across the world of applied health science.

There are opportunities to develop skills towards your PhD and prepare for life beyond it. These might include writing skills and project management, digital storytelling, bid writing or developing a public profile. Read more about our doctoral training provision.

Stonehenge with scientist and PhD student Gavin Leong using observational equipment on the key stones to gain data on Earth's lithosphere.

Postgraduate PhD student Gavin Leong co-authored papers with Dr Matthew Brolly on technologies and processes that reveal prehistoric carving density behind dense lichen growth at Stonehenge.

Postgraduate degree resources for geosciences and physical geography

The interdisciplinary ethos of the School of Applied Sciences provides an ideal home for your research. Based on the university’s Moulsecoomb Campus, research within the school includes exploration of a range of key environmental, social and resource issues, and delivers translational research with local, regional and international benefits.

You will have access to state-of-the-art research facilities allowing experiment in the laboratory and in the field, including specialist geochemical and geotechnical laboratories, microscopy laboratories (optical and scanning electron microscopes), microbial and water quality laboratories, hydraulic flumes, an experimental river basin, a water efficiency laboratory, and a concrete laboratory, as well as a large array of field equipment. All of these facilities are supported by a team of dedicated laboratory and workshop technicians.

You will also benefit from access to international research resources, including the university’s Online Library and its connected services to national and international collections.

As a member of the Brighton Doctoral College, you will benefit from regular opportunities on a training programme designed to support postgraduate researchers at all stages of the PhD and help them achieve their career goals. Attendance at appropriate workshops within this programme is encouraged, as is contribution to the various seminar series hosted by the schools and the annual Postgraduate Research Festival. Academic and technical staff also provide more subject-specific training.

Research Excellence Framework (REF)

Our researchers are internationally recognised with their research making a significant contribution to the latest UK government research assessment exercise (REF 2021). In our submission to the Geography and Environmental Studies unit of assessment, 79 per cent of our research was judged overall as either internationally excellent or world leading, with all our four impact case studies falling in this bracket, demonstrating our exceptional record in applying research to worldwide beneficiaries.

Image of ice and Greenland coast

University of Brighton researcher Dr Lorna Linch co-led an international team of researchers on the remote Qaanaaq Ice Cap, home to the most northerly settlement in Greenland.

Five panel image representing research in environment and society: water, rock, drone, Brighton Pavilion gardens and a water vole.

The University of Brighton's research Centre for Environment and Society

The Centre for Environment and Society fosters interdisciplinary research into the monitoring, management and mitigation of adverse impacts on our planet and the life it supports.

We focus on pressing environmental, health and societal challenges, particularly those arising from climate change, and achieve research excellence in collaboration with a wide global network of academic partners, humanitarian organisations, national, regional and local agencies, regulators, institutions and stakeholder groups.

The applied nature of our research and knowledge exchange activities allows our researchers to deliver meaningful and tangible benefits to the environment, to human health and to society.

The Centre for Environment and Society provides PhD students with a multidisciplinary environment allowing them to utilise the centre’s broad expertise-base. This generates postgraduates with unique knowledge and practical skills, improving future employability.

Supervisors

We strongly recommend that you apply with the support of one of our academics. By establishing your supervisor from the early stages of application, you will be supported through the application process and can make the best start to your programme of study.

You should consider the staff listed below and create a short draft research proposal identifying your suitability for supervision from that person's research specialism and your place in the wider context of the department's research ambitions. Their contact details are available on their full profile.

Our primary staff supervising in the discipline are listed. For further information on university supervisory staff, including cross-disciplinary options, please visit

I鈥檓 interested in supervising postgraduate projects in all areas relating to remote sensing (RS) and geographical information systems (GIS) but particularly those which study ecosystems and ecosystem change and technological developments in relation to this. I currently supervise PhD students conducting studies in remote sensing, for example the assessment of economic drivers of Net Primary Productivity (NPP) from forested areas in the UK, and remote detection of river geomorphology using interferometry.聽 Recent PhD supervision successes have studied subjects such as remote sensing of carvings at Stonehenge, monitoring oil pollution in Nigerian mangroves, modelling seagrass growth in the Arabian Gulf, assessing wine quality from remotely detected vine characteristics, mapping disease prevalence in Cameroon, modelling sediment deposits on the river Lugg, and examining the statistical impact of trench mapping in archaeology. 聽I would like to encourage students to pursue their interests in this field by applying for PhD study or to join the taught MSc Geographical Information Systems and Environmental Management or the research focussed MRes GIS and Remote Sensing degrees at the University of Brighton following undergraduate studies.

For both MRes and PhD, I am particularly interested in supervising projects in the area of聽 intertidal, estuarine and riverine water / sediment interaction and climate. Examples of applications could include:

Quantifying the impact that different types of Nature Based Solutions have on Riverine Flood Management.
The impact that drainage systems have on the development of Managed Realignment sites and the colonisation by intertidal flora.
How mycelium develops in newly inundated intertidal wetlands.
Furthering the understanding into the processes of how terrestrial soil transforms into intertidal sediment when inundated by saline water.
The impact of Coastal Managed and Managed Realignment design has on fish habitats and how engineering could be used to increase habitat suitability, impacting positively on fish stocks. (see: - MR Fish Geomorphology (ICECM 2019) (brighton.ac.uk))
The impact of changing weather patterns on intertidal environments.
Projects related to the CHASM project , particularly the sediment and hydro elements.

Along with any project which brings together the following elements: Natural Flood Management, habitat creation, eco-system services, impact of sea-level rise and impact on health and wellbeing.

Interests for new PhD supervision:

One of my main interests is the stability of rock slopes in permafrost regions: increasing temperatures have caused rock slope failures and rock falls in permafrost regions. The dependency on air temperature, ice thickness in the rock joints and the influence of meltwater will be investigated.

Another interest is the shear strength of rock joints: laboratory measurement of direct shear stength of rock joints is difficult; a PhD project would use repeat measurements using artificial materials to proposed to improve existing models.

Completed PhD supervision:

Binyamien Rasoul (Start 2014, finish 2019): The effect of rice husk ash on the mechanical and durability properties of concrete.

Peshawa Al-Jaf (Start 2014, finish 2019): Modelling flow and recharge in the Chalk unsaturated zone and influence of subsurface geologies, Brighton Block, South East England.

I am particularly keen to supervise Masters and PhD students in the following areas: (1) Ice(berg)-keel scouring (e.g. scour mechanical processes; morphology; sediment deformation; offshore pipeline/cable protection; impacts on blue carbon and climate change); (2) Glacial/Periglacial geomorphology, sedimentology and micromorphology (e.g. landform morphology and formation; depositional and deformational processes; developing microscope techniques such as automation, machine learning); (3) Palaeoglaciology, reconstructing glaciers and ice sheets (e.g. landform mapping; ice extent and dynamics; ice flow histories and chronologies; machine learning); (4) Glaciology (e.g. contemporary ice dynamics; contemporary glacial forelands; ice structure crevasse patterns; ice retreat); (5) Drone aerial photography (e.g. glacial and periglacial landscapes; landform mapping); (6) Glacial pollutants and contaminants (e.g. microplastics; microbial; chemical) and impact on downstream meltwater quality; (7) Artistic engagement with glacial and periglacial landscapes (art-science; how science can be represented through art, and how art may inspire science).

I am interested in supervising postgraduate research students in the following areas: fluvial geomorphology; hydraulics; statistical and numerical modelling for sediment transport; river managment and engineering; development of sensors for monitoring grain motion.

I am interested in supervising PhD and MRes students in the following areas: reconstructing historical climate variability and change; arid geomorphology; environmental change in southern Africa; silcrete provenancing in archaeology.

PhD projects in geochemistry and mineralogy specifically applied to: ore deposit genesis and mineral exploration, critical metals and the environmental impacts of mining; Hydrogeology and the behaviour of nutrient and heavy metals (rural and urban environments); environmental controls on material corrosion.

I contribute to the Centre for Earth Observation Science (in terms of mineral resources, petrology and environmental geochemistry) and the Centre for Aquatic Environments (in terms of hydrogeology and hydrochemistry) and am happy to supervise projects in both these areas as part of the MRes Geosciences and Mres Aquatic Environments. Specific projects at present could include:

Synthesis and characterisation of REE-bearing clays.

Breakdown of sulphide minerals in the environment.

Geology and genesis of REE and other mineral deposits.

Weathering processes in REE mineralised carbonatites.

Microbial corrosion of steel in marine environments.

X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy studies of halogen-bearing silicates.

Unsaturated zone flow processes and groundwater chemistry.

Infiltration water quality from sustainable drainage systems.

Making an application

Once you have prepared a first-rate application you can apply to the University of Brighton through our . When you do, you will require a research proposal, references, a personal statement and a record of your education.

You will be asked whether you have discussed your research proposal and your suitability for doctoral study with a member of the University of Brighton staff. We strongly recommend that all applications are made with the collaboration of at least one potential supervisor. Approaches to potential supervisors can be made directly through the details available online. If you are unsure, please do contact the Doctoral College for advice.

Please visit our How to apply for a PhD page for detailed information.

Fees and funding

Funding

Undertaking research study will require university fees as well as support for your research activities and plans for subsistence during full or part-time study.

Funding sources include self-funding, funding by an employer or industrial partners; there are competitive funding opportunities available in most disciplines through, for example, our own university studentships or national (UK) research councils. International students may have options from either their home-based research funding organisations or may be eligible for some UK funds.

Learn more about the funding opportunities available to you.

Tuition fees academic year 2026–27

Standard fees are listed below, but may vary depending on subject area. Some subject areas may charge bench fees/consumables; this will be decided as part of any offer made. Fees for UK and international/EU students on full-time and part-time courses are likely to incur a small inflation rise each year of a research programme.

MPhil/PhD
Student	Full-time fees	Part-time fees
UK	£5,238	£2,619
International (including EU)	£16,980	N/A
International students registered in the School of Humanities and Social Science or in the School of Business and Law	£15,500	N/A

PhD by Publication
Study method	Fees
Full-time	N/A
Part-time	£2,619

Contact Brighton Doctoral College

To contact the Doctoral College at the University of Brighton we request an email in the first instance. Please visit our contact the Brighton Doctoral College page.

For supervisory contact, please see individual profile pages.

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