Professor Louise Heathwaite

I’m truly interested in how things work, and I like to work independently, so there was no career for me other than being a researcher. I like science to be useful, and when I started my PhD in the Somerset Levels at West Sedgemoor part of it had just been declared a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) but pump drainage of adjacent agricultural land appeared to be linked to aquatic pollution and fish kills. It was a good environmental challenge to work out and understand and to think about the pragmatic application of the science so that farming and conservation could continue to work alongside one another.

I’ve taken my research further by, first of all, working with the Natural Environment Research Council to build strategic research programmes around sustainable use of natural resources, covering everything from energy use through to conservation strategies. I also acted as Chief Scientific Advisor for Rural Affairs, Food and Environment for the Scottish Government, looking at the scientific evidence underpinning a lot of the decisions we make around the environment. Now, I am a Distinguished Professor and in a strategic role as Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research and Enterprise at Lancaster University.

I guess my inspiration to become a scientist was actually not liking to be told what to do! I like working independently and science just offered that opportunity to start from scratch. I often tell my post-docs and early lecturers that the time when you’re a PhD student is when you have three years ahead of you to ‘do your own thing’ and discover something new, which is so exciting.

Louise is holding a Munsell Soil Colour Book – Professor Albert H Munsell was the first person to illustrate colour systematically in three-dimensional space, based on experimental science and it’s been the official colour system for soils research since the 1930s.