UNMC Lake team with Dr Suzanne McGowan
A new student-led research project on the iconic University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus (UNMC) Lake has recently started a research project involving a collaboration between the Faculties of Science and Engineering.
The project is funded by the University's Environment Committee and aims to better understand how small, artificial and ornamental water bodies such as the lake on UNMC campus can be managed within tropical weather conditions.
“Water bodies, such as this lake are often key focal points in urban areas, enhancing community wellbeing and increasing real estate values through beautification of the environment, and yet water quality degradation is an increasingly common problem and our research aims to address this,” said Dr Suzanne McGowan, Head of School of the School of Geography at UNMC.
Specifically, the project will focus on monitoring the Lake Hydrology, chemistry and biology to address three key questions:
- What is causing the yellow colour in the lake water?
- What is the rate of sediment infilling and will this need to be managed in the near future?
- Which management strategies can be implemented to improve the ecological and aesthetic quality of the lake?
UNMC lake is signature feature of the Nottingham campus experience, with international campuses in the UK and China each having their own lake overlooked by the central Trent Building. UNMC is looking at more environmentally sustainable approaches to managing these water features starting with its own lake on the Malaysia campus.
"The lake is the first feature that people see when they enter the campus, and there is a great deal of affection for the site within the University community. There have been many speculative comments about the lake water, but the truth is we don't know for sure why the lake water is sometimes that yellowish colour or what controls the changes in colour.
This project will fill these knowledge gaps and help us to manage the lake in a more informed way in the future. More generally, we don't know much about small artificial water bodies in the tropics, and yet they are numerous throughout Malaysia. We hope that our research will make a contribution to the sustainable management of similar sites especially in Malaysia,"Dr McGowan said.
The research is managed by UNMC Lake Team which consists of Dr Suzanne McGowan, Head of School of Geography; Dr Stephanie Evers, Assistant Professor at the School of Biosciences; Dr Svenja Hanson, Head of Department of the School of Chemical and Environmental Engineering and students conducting postgraduate dissertation project; Doris Ifeoma Ogeueri and Mohammed Suleman Gumsuri, and undergraduate interns Derick Liew and Toh Phang Sum and Koh Ghia Huei.
The team will monitor the lake weekly, to investigate whether the inflows are delivering materials such as suspended sediments and pollutants into the lake. They will try to establish how the timing and intensity of rainfall might be linked to the lake water quality. They will also look at the organisms that live in the lake to establish how the food web is structured.
Additional to the weekly monitoring programme the team will be trying to establish some vital statistics on the lake such as how deep it is, what volume of water it holds, and how quickly the water passes through the lake. This integration of this information should allow much more targeted management of UNMC lake and advance our understanding of these important and heavily-utilised lake types.
Latest developments on The UNMC Lake Project can be found on Blog and Facebook.
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More information is available from Dr Suzanne McGowan on +6 (03) 8924 8733 or Josephine Dionisappu, PR & Communications Manager on +6 (03) 89248746.
Notes to editors: The University of Nottingham has 43,000 students and is ‘the nearest Britain has to a truly global university, with campuses in China and Malaysia modelled on a headquarters that is among the most attractive in Britain’ (Times Good University Guide 2014). It is also the most popular university among graduate employers, the world’s greenest university, and winner of the Times Higher Education Award for ‘Outstanding Contribution to Sustainable Development’. It is ranked in the World's Top 75 universities by the QS World University Rankings.
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Posted on 27th June 2014