HReSOeARRch IzOnS

In this issue FOOD SECURITY plus South Asian heart disease, volcanic eruptions and a Bronze Age mystery

University of Cambridge research magazine www.cam.ac.uk/research/ Issue 15 2 | contents Issue 15: June 2011 Food security

Research news 3–5 M a r k

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Spotlight: 6–17 n i s z k Food security o Turbocharging a new Green 6 Revolution Predictive modelling of plant 8 growth for food and fuel Invigorating plants 9 Field to fork: safeguarding 10 livestock health Foreseer of future resources 12 In soil we trust 13 Modelling the root of crop 14 disease Nature’s value to business 15 Farming and the fate of 16 wild nature Knowledge exchange 18 –19 Exploding the ivory tower myth Global food security is one of the major challenges that we face in the 21st century. The task is Preview 20 –21 to ensure affordable access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food for an active and healthy life Eruptions that shook the world for all. For Cambridge, this is both a challenge and an opportunity to focus and integrate our Features 22 –30 remarkable research expertise in the natural, clinical and social sciences coupled with the humanities to develop tractable solutions for global food security. These must be sustainable, 300 years of list-making 22 socially equitable and ecologically successful – the so-called ‘doubly-green revolution’. High-risk hearts: a South Asian 24 The task is made more urgent by the rapid rate of population growth and by the effects of epidemic climate change. These are leading to competing demands for energy, food and water, accentuated by demographic changes and urbanisation. Food demand is predicted to increase Island of broken figurines 26 by 70% between now and 2050, when the global population is estimated to reach nine billion. FluPhone: disease tracking by 28 Even now, with the world population tipping 6.9 billion, one billion people in developing countries do not have enough food to meet their basic needs. Meanwhile, the consequences app of unhealthy diets beset populations in the developed world. Musical notes from Stalin’s 30 Some of the underpinning research on global food security is featured in this issue of prize-givers Research Horizons , including programmes on influenza-resistant strains of poultry, ‘land- sparing’ to optimise crop yields while conserving natural biodiversity, and managing the Inside out 31 control of plant disease. Fundamental research is under way to understand the machinery of Dr Emily Lethbridge plant development, hybrid vigour and photosynthesis, to enable plant breeders to adapt crops for higher yields under changing climatic conditions. Other research is drawing together The back page 32 economists and conservationists to formulate new ways to manage soil, and Cambridge engineers, geographers, biologists and mathematicians to develop tools to predict future Cover: Farmer demands for energy, land and water. transplanting rice; see page 6 for Many of the Cambridge projects are engaging directly with producers and consumers, as research aimed at well as with policy makers, industry and conservationists at national and international scales. re-engineering These interactions underline the convening power as well as the research and teaching rice for higher yields. capacity of the University. Photographer: Ariel The long-term goals of food security in Cambridge have recently benefited from the Javellana/part of opening of the £82 million Sainsbury Laboratory. Earlier this year, we agreed a memorandum the image collection of understanding to promote closer interactions with the Biotechnology and Biological of the International Rice Research Sciences Research Council, the lead partner for the UK initiative in global food security. Plans Institute now focus on drawing further on the breadth of research in Cambridge to establish linkages (www.irri.org/). across the natural and clinical sciences with the social sciences and humanities in addressing global food security. Editor: Dr Louise Walsh ([email protected]) Designed by iDentityCreative (www.identitycreative.co.uk/). Printed by Falcon Printing Services Ltd (www.falcon-printing.co.uk/). ©2011 University of Cambridge and Professor Chris Gilligan Contributors as identified. All rights reserved. Head of the School of Biological Sciences Research news | 3 Red letter day for Darwin correspondence Project A £5 million funding package ensures the completion of a project mapping Charles Darwin’s life and work through his correspondence. r e Widely acknowledged as the greatest p r o d

editorial project in the history of science, the u c e

Darwin Correspondence Project is locating, d

b y transcribing, researching and editing p e r thousands of letters written to and from M i s s i

Charles Darwin. A new £5 million funding o n package will now ensure the completion of o f

t the award-winning edition of the h e

s y

Correspondence of Charles Darwin . n d i The letters were exchanged with around c s

o

2,000 correspondents and take in every f

c a stage of Darwin’s life: from school and M b r i student days through the voyage of HMS d g e

Beagle ; the publication of On the Origin of u n i v

Species and the controversies that followed; e r s i his later publications on the implications of t y

L i his theories for humans; right up to his b r a r

death. They offer unparalleled, intimate y insight into every aspect both of Darwin’s scientific work and of his personal life, and also into the lives and work of many of his contemporaries. “Darwin’s letters are vitally important in showing how science is done, with the constant gathering of new data, and the testing and questioning of theories and ideas,” said Professor Jim Secord, Director of Letter sent to Darwin on hMS Beagle by his sister on 12 February 1834 (his birthday); cUL DAR 204: 102 the Project, which is jointly managed by Cambridge University Library and the £2.5 million from the newly established impossible to secure long-term funds, and so American Council of Learned Societies. Evolution Education Trust is matched by much project time is taken up in applying for The funding has been given in generous grants from The Andrew W. Mellon and managing short-term grants. Now we recognition of the potential that the Foundation, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation can concentrate on finishing the job.” completed edition of Darwin’s letters will and the Isaac Newton Trust. have – not only as a foundation and catalyst “We are deeply grateful for this visionary For more information, including freely for further scholarship, but also for education support,” added Professor Secord. “The available summaries of letters, please visit in all aspects of evolution and its history. The greatest threat to long-running projects in the Darwin Correspondence Project website lead gift to the University Library of the arts and humanities is that it’s almost (www.darwinproject.ac.uk/).

Roadmapping a €1 billion graphene programme J a n n

Cambridge is leading the technology roadmap of a pilot project i k

M e

towards a €1 billion European graphene research programme. y e r An ambitious European initiative aims to between fundamental research and achieve a radical shift in information and applications,” explained Dr Ferrari. communication technology by exploiting “Exploiting the full potential of graphene will the unique properties of graphene. have huge impacts on society at large.” Dr Andrea Ferrari at the Department of “We are thrilled that the European Engineering is leading the pilot technology Commission shares our view and believes in roadmap towards the €1 billion programme. our focused and open approach, at a time Graphene is a one-atom-thick sheet of when the international community, from the carbons in a honeycomb lattice. Its high United States to Korea, is moving significant electrical conductivity and optical resources to strengthen their know-how and transparency mean that it is ideal for facilitate the roadmap to applications.” applications such as touchscreens, liquid The pilot phase, which involves nine crystal displays, organic light-emitting European institutions, including four Nobel diodes, and for a spectrum of advanced Prize winners, will pave the way for the full, devices based on emerging technologies, 10-year, €1 billion flagship programme. The such as spintronics. plan for this will be submitted to the Artist’s impression of a graphene sheet “Graphene, a truly European technology, European Commission in 2012, aiming for initiated by Nobel Prize winners Geim and GRAPHENE to be one of the two flagship For more information, please visit Novoselov in the UK, is at the crossroad programmes launched in 2013. www.graphene-flagship.eu/GF/index.php 4 | Research news © i s t o c

Lumora’s bright k p h o t o . future c o M / r The future looks bright for o M a

luminescence-technology- n

o k based University of o p n Cambridge spin-out company y Lumora Limited.

Lumora Limited, which was spun out from the Department of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology in 2003, has completed a new funding round worth £1.5 million and licensed its food safety tests to a global leader in the food safety field that is commercialising the technology. With initial funding from Cambridge Enterprise, Lumora was formed to commercialise its novel BART cause the sample to glow when a test result Gates Foundation – to develop the BART (Bioluminescent Assay in Real Time) system is positive. system for this purpose. for use in the food sector. The BART system Now that its food safety tests are on their “This new funding will enable us to was designed to detect pathogens such as way to market, Lumora is expanding into the accelerate our entry into the in vitro Salmonella cheaply and quickly in food, and field of in vitro diagnostics for sexually diagnostics market, and we are delighted to is also able to detect ‘food fraud’, where food transmitted disease and HIV testing. BART have Catapult Venture Managers on board,” is labelled so as to intentionally deceive the technology can be applied to clinical said Dr Laurence Tisi, co-founder of Lumora. consumer for financial gain. samples in the same way as for food testing, “We believe our technology could make an Lumora’s technology works by using with simple modifications to the preparation enormous difference to infectious disease a modified version of luciferase – the process to handle the different types of testing in the developing world.” same enzyme that is responsible for samples. The company is currently working bioluminescence in fireflies – to signal the with PATH – a major international non-profit For more information, please visit presence of specific DNA sequences, which organisation supported by the Bill & Melinda www.lumora.co.uk/

Policy Fellowships Programme extended Royal Society

The Centre for Science and Policy announces plans to scale up a Fellows unique programme that bridges policy and academia. Seven Cambridge researchers have been elected Fellows of the The Policy Fellowships Programme at the Current Fellows include Director-level Royal Society. Centre for Science and Policy (CSaP) is being officials from government departments such scaled up to 30 new Fellows for the next as the Department for Business, Innovation The new Fellows, who join the ranks of the academic year following the success of a pilot and Skills, Department of Energy and Climate UK and Commonwealth’s leading scientists programme which, over the past year, has Change, Home Office, Department for including early Royal Society Fellows such as brought policy professionals in government Transport, and Department for Communities Isaac Newton, Robert Boyle and Charles and industry face to face with researchers in and Local Government, as well as senior Darwin, are: science and engineering. business people from BP, Pfizer and BAA. • Professor Andrew Balmford, Professor of At the beginning of the two-year Topic areas for the extended programme Conservation Science at the Department Fellowship, an intensive tailored programme will continue to range widely across the of Zoology (see page 16). of one-on-one meetings with researchers disciplines in natural and social sciences and • Professor Jeremy Baumberg, Professor of provides each Fellow with a valuable refresh engineering: from sustainability, energy NanoPhotonics in the Department of in relevant policy areas. efficiency, behaviour change and Physics and Director of the NanoPhotonics The programme also adds value to the biotechnology, to risk and resilience, food Centre. University by exposing researchers to security and the ‘innovation ecosystem’. • Professor Béla Bollobás, Senior Research decision makers in government and by Dr Bob Sorrell (VP for Public Partnerships Fellow of Trinity College. providing direct pathways by which research at BP, and the first industry Policy Fellow) • Professor Clare Grey, Geoffrey Moorhouse can have an impact on the development of commented: “I spent a fantastic week in Gibson Professor of Chemistry at the policy. Increasingly, Fellows will be drawn Cambridge from which I took away a valuable Department of Chemistry. from industry as well as government, network of contacts and a whole stream of • Sir Colin Humphreys, Director of Research reflecting the influence of corporate agendas insights. I came in with a particular at the Department of Materials Science on research and policy making. expectation, but came away with something and Metallurgy. Professor Jon Crowcroft (see page 28) completely unexpected – the Fellowship • Professor Robert Kennicutt, Plumian from the Computer Laboratory welcomed challenged my thinking on a range of issues.” Professor of Astronomy and Experimental “the opportunity to interact directly with Philosophy at the Institute of Astronomy. policy makers, and to offer them evidence of For further details, please contact • Professor Simon Tavaré from the Department the kinds of technologies that they must [email protected] or visit of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical factor into their decisions.” www.csap.cam.ac.uk/ Physics and the Department of Oncology. Research news | 5 Power in the New strain of MRSA discovered balance A new strain of MRSA occurs in both human and dairy cow populations. A new research hub will study r o emerging powers and how y a L t nations evolve to become y - f r e leading political forces on the e

i M world stage. a g e

c o L

Research at the Centre for Rising Powers will L e c t i

touch on one of the most important o n / questions in international relations: how f L i c do different powers rise to the top of k r international politics, and can we predict their impact? Some of the Centre’s research will concern the big, emerging powers of the present day – in particular the so-called BRIC nations of Brazil, Russia, India and China. Uniquely, however, it will also look at A study led by Dr Mark Holmes from the currently used to identify MRSA – historical cases to understand more about Department of Veterinary Medicine has a polymerase chain reaction technique and how new powers emerge, how they can be identified a new strain of MRSA in milk from slide agglutination testing – do not detect this accommodated, and the effect that this has dairy cows while researching mastitis, a new strain. on international stability in different cases. bacterial infection that occurs in the cows’ The research, which was published in The Dr Amrita Narlikar, Director of the Centre, udders. Lancet Infectious Diseases in June, raises said: “Power transitions are one of the main Dr Laura García-Álvarez, first author of the questions about whether cows could be a sources of deadlock and conflict on the world paper, who discovered the new strain while a reservoir for the new strain of MRSA. “Although stage, but they also have the potential to act PhD student at the University of Cambridge’s there is circumstantial evidence that dairy cows as sources of renewal and change for the Veterinary School, said: “To find the same new are providing a reservoir of infection,” said better. As a result, the study of how powers strain in both humans and cows is certainly Dr Holmes, “it is still not known for certain if rise and how the process should be handled worrying. However, pasteurisation of milk will cows are infecting people, or people are has a direct impact on international prevent any risk of infection via the food chain. infecting cows.” co-operation, peace and stability – and on Workers on dairy farms may be at higher risk of “Although our research suggests that the more general values such as efficiency, carrying MRSA, but we do not yet know if this new MRSA accounts for a small proportion of fairness and justice in the global order.” translates into a higher risk of infection. In MRSA – probably less than 100 isolations per “The Centre’s research will, in some form year in the UK – it does appear that the the wider UK community, less than 1% of or other, be of international policy relevance,” numbers are rising.” individuals carry MRSA – typically in their noses added Dr Narlikar. Research findings will be With funding from the Medical Research – without becoming ill.” fed back to policy-makers through the Council, the researchers will next be When Dr Matt Holden and a research team Centre’s links with various think-tanks, policy undertaking prevalence surveys in people and at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute institutions and private sector organisations, in dairy cattle in the UK to determine how sequenced the entire genome they realised and through regular seminars, conferences much new MRSA is present in these that the new strain possessed unconventional and workshops. populations. They will also be performing an DNA for MRSA. Subsequent research revealed Joseph Nye, University Distinguished epidemiological study on farms to identify any that the new strain was also present in Service Professor at Harvard University, gave factors that may be associated with infection humans. It was found in samples from the inaugural lecture for the Centre, which is by the new MRSA, to look for further new in the Department of Politics and Scotland, England and Denmark, and has since MRSA strains, and to explore the potential risks International Studies. been identified in Ireland and Germany. of the new strain to farm workers. The new strain’s genetic make-up differs For more information, please visit greatly from previous strains, which means that For more information, please contact www.polis.cam.ac.uk/crp/ the ‘gold standard’ molecular tests that are Dr Mark Holmes ([email protected]). Tap into cambridge research A new research website and e-bulletin has been launched by the University.

If you’re interested in keeping on top of the also have their say on the issues latest research from the Univerity of discussed in the comments box under Cambridge, take a look at our new research each story. website (www.cam.ac.uk/research/). You can also subscribe to a new As well as news about recent findings e-bulletin, bringing you a round-up of the and publications, you'll find features, latest research news and features delivered themed areas, videos and audio items to your in-box every week. To subscribe, about broader areas of research. It’s fully please sign up to receive the bulletin by searchable, easy to use, and readers can email at www.cam.ac.uk/research/bulletin 6 | Food security b o t h

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Rice plants propagated using tissue culture at the Turbocharging a new International Rice Research Institute, Philippines Green Revolution

asteful, inefficient, ‘relic of a nature’s remedies Plant scientists in Cambridge bygone age’ – all indictments that The approaches taken by the two scientists have embarked on ambitious Whave been levelled at RuBisCO, the aim to maximise the operating efficiency plans to improve crop yields by most abundant protein in nature and the of RuBisCO by turbocharging it with an heart of the reaction that feeds life on Earth. solving one of the chief increased concentration of CO 2. limitations of photosynthesis. The enzyme is the powerhouse behind “Fortuitously, some plants have photosynthesis, responsible for taking CO 2 developed such a turbocharger,” explained from the atmosphere and using the sun’s Professor Griffiths. “Among them, certain energy to convert it into the sugars that land plants have an advanced type of

crops need to grow. photosynthesis termed C 4, and aquatic But, as its full name, Ribulose 1,5- algae have developed mechanisms that Bisphosphate Carboxylase/Oxygenase, might actively concentrate bicarbonate to provide

suggest, the enzyme has an unfortunate a source of CO 2 for the enzyme. Our tendency to promiscuity. It evolved at a time research aims to emulate what nature has when the Earth’s atmosphere was very already accomplished, for the benefit of different to the 500-fold excess of O 2 over CO 2 future food security.” that we have today and, as a result, it The main focus for Dr Hibberd is rice, a sometimes mistakes O 2 for CO 2, to the cereal grown in global regions where the detriment of potential plant productivity. population is predicted to grow fastest. Plant scientists such as Dr Julian Hibberd “About 60% of the world’s population lives in and Professor Howard Griffiths believe that Asia, where each hectare of land used for rice overcoming this inefficiency could be the key production currently provides food for 27 both to achieving a leap in the amount of people, but by 2050 will have to support at food or energy a plant can produce from the least 43 people,” he said. “One way to alleviate same amount of sunlight and to revitalising food shortages is to develop higher-yielding the Green Revolution, which has been rice by reconfiguring its photosynthetic slowing as the yields of elite cultivars pathway towards that used by land plants approach their natural limits. that have evolved the upgraded version.” Food security | 7

Most of the world’s plants produce a determinants of RuBisCO operating efficiency sugar with a 3-carbon skeleton in a process not just in land plants but also in algae. termed C 3 photosynthesis. In fact, bacteria Algae use a carbon-concentrating developed this means to convert light mechanism that is usually associated with a energy into sugar about 3.4 billion years ago. microcompartment called the chloroplast Fast forward to a comparatively recent pyrenoid. Although very little is known 30 million years ago, and the C 4 pathway about their properties, these structures drive evolved, in which the initial CO 2 fixation a remarkable 15% of global carbon-based product is a 4-carbon organic acid. Today, C 4 productivity. is found in 4% of plants including maize and To gain insight into one of the most sugarcane, as well as in 14 of the world’s 18 important, yet poorly understood, carbon worst weeds. sequestration mechanisms, Professor Griffiths “Remarkably, C 4 photosynthesis has leads a new project recently funded as part of evolved independently in at least 62 lineages an IdeasLab competition for the best minds of plants,” added Dr Hibberd. “We think it from the USA and the UK to join forces to developed in response to selection pressures explore improving photosynthetic yields. The c 4 turbocharger: rings of cells in the plant leaf such as low amounts of CO , high fix and concentrate cO 2 before supplying it to 2 The project is one of two transatlantic RuBiscO (in the central cell above) temperatures and more arid conditions.” IdeasLab collaborations involving Cambridge Crucially, C 4 plants produce higher yields that were awarded a total of £2.85 million for the same amount of light energy, have from the Biotechnology and Biological double the water-use efficiency of C 3 plants, Sciences Research Council and the US and their leaves use about 40% less nitrogen National Science Foundation. Dr Hibberd is a to achieve 50% higher yields. A host of member of the other collaboration, which is biochemical, cellular and anatomical changes boosting RuBisCO using tricks to enhance in the C plant result in a mechanism that first 4 CO transport that are associated with other concentrates CO and then supplies it to 2 2 metabolic processes but that, according to RuBisCO in the C pathway. 3 current knowledge, are not used in And therein lies the challenge. To photosynthesis. unpick the C apparatus and rebuild it in 4 Professor Griffiths explained how algal rice involves literally dozens of genetic components could provide the answer to changes, as well as alterations to biochemical shaking up a wasteful enzyme: “We’ve known reactions and even to the way the leaf is built. for 30 years that the algal pyrenoid has The project is requiring a major scientific solved the problem of an inefficient RuBisCO effort, called the C Rice Consortium, funded 4 enzyme, which probably evolved to help by $22 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates algae survive in the lower levels of CO Foundation. 2 availability found in water. Our work has Unpicking and rebuilding investigated genetic changes in the model alga Chlamydomonas that can determine The C Rice Consortium involves 12 partner 4 whether the pyrenoid appears or not. The institutions across four continents and is led new project will have direct applications for by the International Rice Research Institute improving algal bioenergy productivity, as (IRRI) in the Philippines. well as potential implications for In the two years since the project began, transforming higher plant crop yields by “Our research aims to emulate the Consortium members have been emulating the carbon-concentrating working on a number of complementary what nature has already mechanism in every photosynthetically approaches. Dr Hibberd’s team has been accomplished, for the benefit of cloning genes required for the biochemical active cell of the plant.” future food security.” reactions, and transgenic strains of rice that express them are being grown at IRRI. A longer term solution The scientists are confident that now is a Other groups are looking for C 4 mutants that pivotal time for current progress in have lost their leaf anatomy, and C 3 mutants that have developed it; and a vast gene understanding photosynthesis to be sequencing screen is searching for new harnessed with genetic techniques and traditional breeding resources to improve C4 genes. Dr Hibberd’s recent findings, published in crop yields for the future. Nevertheless, none Science magazine in April 2011, suggest that of the projects is a trivial undertaking, as genes present in C 3 species can be recruited Dr Hibberd explained: “We’re looking ahead into cell-specific functions in the C 4 pathway to at least 15–20 years from now, to without alterations to their gene sequence. transform crop production in the decades “The discovery dramatically alters the when the potential yield of current crops approaches being taken to engineer C 4 has been exhaustively maximised.” photosynthesis,” he explained. “These results “For the next generation, plant and Dr Julian hibberd (left) and suggest that it’s possible that only some parts microbial productivity will become the Professor howard Griffiths of the C 4 pathway might be needed in rice for focus of key global issues,” added Professor For more information, please contact other parts to fall into place.” Griffiths. “It will be the basis for feeding an Dr Julian Hibberd ([email protected]) additional two to three billion mouths, for and Professor Howard Griffiths IdeasLab maintaining biodiversity in the face of ([email protected]) at the As steps are taken to maximise plant climate change and for driving forward an Department of Plant Sciences productivity over the next century, there is economy currently trading on past (www.plantsci.cam.ac.uk/). a pressing need to understand the sunlight.” 8 | Food security d r

M might associate and dissociate at millisecond a r

c scales, or even less.” u s

h Professor Meyerowitz likens the approach e i s

L the scientists will be taking to the computer- e r aided design process used for the Boeing 777 commercial aeroplane: “We’re not designing a plant – it’s already there – but we’re learning how it’s put together. In fact, plants are so complex that it will be like designing the full interactions of 10 million airplanes of 50 different types. But we know what sort of data we want, and we know how to turn it into knowledge using computational models.” Computational modelling and mathematical and engineering-based approaches will therefore feature strongly alongside expertise in genetics, cell biology, physiology and evolutionary biology within the Laboratory.

Predictive modelling Professor Meyerowitz studies the genetics of flowering plants, especially the small laboratory plant Arabidopsis thaliana . His team was the first to identify and clone several flower development genes. Two Predictive modelling decades ago, they pioneered the re-engineering of flower design, replacing of plant growth for the flowering organs with other organs – a potential 625 possible types of flowers. food and fuel The scientists can already model many aspects of plant development and then test if the hypotheses about plant behaviour are Live imaging of the growing tips of plants as they correct. The future research of the Sainsbury Fundamental research on plant make flowers; data such as these lead to computational models of plant growth Laboratory will be channelled into such development at the Sainsbury models, with ever-increasing complexity. Laboratory will help in the future And, by elucidating the intricacies of plant design of optimal crops. development, the research will facilitate re-designing crops of the future. “We’re aimed at 10 or 20, or even 50, search for answers to the mysteries of communication network that exists across the years from now so that people can exploit the plant development lies at the heart of plant as a whole. The movement of small basic knowledge that we’ve generated, the Aresearch at the Sainsbury Laboratory, a molecules between cells effectively enables way the basic knowledge of 30 years ago is newly opened institute that was made plant cells to ‘talk to each other’ during being exploited now,” added Professor possible by an £82 million grant from the development and to react to their Meyerowitz. “We’re pretty sure we can figure Gatsby Charitable Foundation. In due course, environment. out how plants develop. It’s not a dream.” the Laboratory will house 120 research “Our work aims to understand how plants scientists focused on the multifaceted events ‘read-in’ their environment and ‘read-out’ this that unfold from the moment a single plant information as particular patterns of growth egg cell is fertilised. and development,” said Professor Meyerowitz. Understanding plant development is both Take, for example, branching in plants: a fascinating and vitally important intellectual how does a plant know where and when to challenge, as Professor Elliot Meyerowitz, the form a branch from its stem, and why does Laboratory’s inaugural Director, explained: pruning make a plant bushier? Professor “The answers will not only enhance our Ottoline Leyser, Associate Director of the fundamental understanding of life, they will Sainsbury Laboratory, discovered a hormone also have important application to a critical network that governs the process. Moving problem that faces the world today – how to over long distances in the plant, the hormones feed and fuel a growing population with provide a rich source of information that is limited resources of land, water and energy.” then locally interpreted to regulate branching. “It is this complex web of interaction that Professor elliot Meyerowitz More complicated than an makes living organisms more than the sum of and Professor Ottoline Leyser aeroplane their parts,” added Professor Meyerowitz. “Even For more information, please Scientists know some of the structures a small plant can have 10 million cells contact Professor Elliot Meyerowitz involved in how a plant develops – the communicating in a whole variety of different ([email protected]) at the machinery for processing DNA information modalities, chemical and physical. There may Sainsbury Laboratory and the basis of cellular behaviour, for be 50 different types of plant cells, and each (www.slcu.cam.ac.uk/). instance. Less is known about the complex cell might have 30,000 different proteins that Food security | 9 © i s t o c k p h o t o . c o M / t o M a s

b e r c i c

Invigorating plants

Understanding how plants ‘silence’ invading viruses could hold the key to releasing the hidden potential of plants.

ne of the key elements of the Green quicker next time, plant cells retain the siRNA in an offspring that is better than either Revolution – when a series of as a means of escalating the defence response parent.“ Oagricultural initiatives dramatically next time the plant sees the invader,” explained With funding from the Biotechnology and boosted crop productivity worldwide – Professor Baulcombe. Biological Sciences Research Council, was the harnessing of hybrid vigour. This “Understanding this opens up the European Union, Royal Society and Gatsby phenomenon occurs when the crossing of possibility of harnessing the process to protect Foundation, and the benefit of newly available two inbred strains results in offspring with plants against viral diseases – by furnishing the DNA sequences of many crops, Professor superior qualities. plant with the siRNA so that it is permanently Baulcombe’s team are beginning to exploit this Professor Sir David Baulcombe, Regius and genetically able to fight off the disease new understanding by predicting which mix of Professor of Botany in the Department of even though it has never seen it.” siRNA will produce the improved offspring. Plant Sciences, hopes that a new molecular It turns out that the process is of interest Within their sights is a glimpse of how understanding of hybrid vigour could not just as a means of protecting crops from future plant breeding could change underpin technology-based plant pathogens but also because, in modern plants, dramatically, by being able to predict on an modifications to stave off future food RNA silencing has diversified into a unprecedented molecular scale how breeders shortages. This time, he believes, “it will be mechanism that protects them from the can improve crops by unlocking the latent possible to predict precisely which parents effects of ‘selfish’ DNA. This process appears to potential in plant genomes. will produce the best hybrid and to fine-tune lie at the heart of hybrid vigour. aspects of that improvement, whether it’s yield, drought tolerance or disease resistance.” Releasing latent potential Over millions of years, plants have acquired Plants have memories too pieces of junk DNA – some are the relics of The story begins with a small interfering past viral infections, others are moveable ribonucleic acid (siRNA). Plants, like animals, elements capable of ‘jumping’ around the have developed mechanisms to ward off genome; all are termed selfish because, disease and ‘remember’ past infections. One of depending on where they end up, the junk the most important plant defences against DNA can activate or suppress genes. Plants use viruses, as discovered by Professor Baulcombe, RNA silencing to shut down the selfish DNA in is called RNA silencing. their genomes. Plant cells recognise the foreign genetic “We now realise that because different material of the virus, copy a section of the viral varieties of the same plant have different Professor Sir David DNA into siRNA and use it as a ‘specificity selfish DNA and different siRNAs to combat Baulcombe determinant’. The siRNA binds to the viral it, this could be one mechanism for For more information, please contact genetic material and, rather like hoisting a explaining the mysteries of hybrid vigour,” Professor Sir David Baulcombe molecular flag to identify the marauder, causes said Professor Baulcombe. “Crossing two ([email protected]) at the a protein called Argonaute to bind and stop varieties results in a mix of siRNA that is Department of Plant Sciences or visit the virus from working. different to that of either parent. In some www.plantsci.cam.ac.uk/research/ “Just as our immune system can be primed cases, the new mix optimally turns the right davidbaulcombe.html by an infection so that we can fight it off combination of genes on and off and results 10 | Food security

Veterinary research in Cambridge is spearheading a new generation of preventive methods to protect livestock from disease.

A genetically modified chicken that prevents Field to fork: safeguarding spreading of avian influenza to other chickens livestock health

staggering 17 billion chickens, almost livestock that contaminate meat and cause the risk for people who are exposed to the 10 billion pigs, and nearly 2 billion food poisoning. infected birds. Aeach of cattle and sheep were kept as Research at the Department of Veterinary The scientists introduced a new gene that livestock animals worldwide in 2009. And, by Medicine is tackling disease on all of these manufactures a ‘decoy’ molecule into the 2050, world meat production is projected to fronts in what Professor Maskell has described chicken genome. In a clever move to confuse double, principally in developing countries. as “a perfect marriage between fundamental the flu virus into ignoring its own replication With the added strain of increasing meat biological research and applied clinical needs, the decoy mimics an important production on resources such as land, water, outcomes.” control element of the virus and diverts the crops and energy, it’s vital to maximise the viral replication machinery away from its own ‘output for input’, as Professor Duncan ‘Flu-free’ chickens genetic material. Maskell, Head of Cambridge’s Department of A breakthrough was announced earlier this “Because the control element is Veterinary Medicine, explained: “How you year that could prevent future bird flu absolutely conserved across strains, we should apportion crops between food for outbreaks from spreading within poultry expect that the decoy will work against all animals and food and fuel for humans is a flocks. Dr Laurence Tiley, in collaboration with strains of avian influenza and be difficult for complex question, so it’s crucial to ensure that researchers in the Roslin Institute at the the virus to evolve around,” said Dr Tiley, resource input counts in terms of output of University of Edinburgh, produced the world’s whose research was funded by the meat, and one of the main moderators of this first genetically modified chickens that Biotechnology and Biological Sciences relationship is animal welfare, especially in prevent the spread of avian influenza. Research Council (BBSRC). Although the birds terms of infectious disease.” Since 2003, over 300 million poultry have become sick themselves, they don’t transmit Viral epidemics can sweep through been culled as a result of influenza outbreaks, the infection to other chickens, even those livestock, and endemic diseases such as and in some countries the virus is now without the decoy molecule. respiratory infections can affect the rate at endemic in wild bird populations. Preventing “At this stage, the chickens are not which animals grow. A further risk to food virus transmission in chickens would reduce intended for consumption,” Dr Tiley added. security is posed by bacterial infections of both the economic impact of the disease and “This genetic modification is a significant first Food security | 11 d n a o v

r step. Our objective now is to develop spray and protect against Actinobacillus i r d i e

h

chickens that are completely resistant to pleuropneumoniae , Haemophilus parasuis, r a u y s M s avian flu.” Mycoplasma hyopneumonia/hyorhinis and a e n L L ,

Streptococcus suis . “Our gold standard t h e

would be to create a live vaccine based r Threats from the wild o s

L Viral epidemics are not just a concern in on a mutated version of one of these i n i n livestock, but also in relation to wildlife, as bacteria that no longer causes the disease, s t i t Professor James Wood explained: “Often, and then engineer it to display portions u t e

, of the other three bacteria so that a strong

emerging infectious diseases originating from u n i v wildlife are a particular challenge because immune response is made to all,” said e r s Dr Tucker. i little might be known about the virus, how it’s t y o transmitted to livestock and humans, or the High-throughout sequencing in f e d potential for epidemics to spread.” collaboration with the Wellcome Trust i n b u Nipah virus, for example, was first Sanger Institute is enabling the scientists to r g h recognised in 1999 when an outbreak assemble the largest ever sequenced causing severe inflammation of the brain collection of these bacteria. The team has occurred in pigs and pig farmers in Malaysia. begun to identify which genes need to be When the source of the virus was traced, it ‘knocked out’ to provide a live vaccine – was found to be on fruit contaminated by information that will also help in infected fruit bats, the natural host of the understanding why some strains cause more virulent disease than others. Infectious diseases carried by animals in the wild, virus. such as this bat in Ghana, can be transmitted to “Bats epitomise the growing challenges Alongside vaccine development, a livestock associated with the spread of wildlife diagnostic kit will be developed to detect all diseases,” added Professor Wood: “They are four pathogens in less than six hours. The goal associated with a wide range of viruses, live in is to have a diagnostic test and potential close proximity to animals and humans, and vaccine ready for field trials at Huazhong many important puzzles remain about the Agricultural University in China within three social, environmental and biological years. dynamics that shape pathogen transmission.” The first steps to remedy this lack of Safety first information were taken last year when a Diseases can also be spread by meat. unique network was created comprising Although the global incidence of food-borne experts from institutions worldwide including illness is difficult to estimate, up to 30% of the collaborators in Bangladesh, Ghana and population in industrialised countries may be Kenya. The consortium was funded by a affected each year according to the World Catalyst grant from the Medical Research Health Organization. Council and three other research councils. “The network has a long-term aim of creating vitally needed interdisciplinary knowledge,” “One key aim is to provide the said Professor Wood, one of the leaders of the fundamental knowledge and network, “as well as pioneering interventions clinical tools to keep livestock geared to enabling bats, animals and people healthy and our food safe.” to co-exist with reduced disease risk.”

Super-vaccination at one sniff Salmonella and Campylobacter – two of Respiratory infections in pigs are a major the most common sources of food-borne animal welfare issue and cost the pig industry disease – are the basis of multiple research millions of pounds each year. An innovative programmes at the Department of Veterinary project has begun the process of developing Medicine, such as the research led by a ‘super-vaccine’ to guard against infection by Professor Maskell. His team has particularly the bacteria that are responsible for the most focused on understanding the dynamics of serious infections. the interactions of bacteria with their animal Funded with £5.6 million from the BBSRC, hosts. the consortium links experts from the “Thanks to the completion of genome University of Cambridge, Imperial College sequences for many of the chief culprits and London (the project co-ordinator), the the advent of high-throughput sequencing,” London School of Hygiene and Tropical said Professor Maskell, “the door has been Medicine, and the Royal Veterinary College. opened on many of the secrets of how Dr Dan Tucker, who together with pathogens such as salmonellae cause Professor Maskell leads the Cambridge disease.” From left: Dr Dan Tucker, component of the five-year project, explained “We are committed to maintaining strong why these infections matter so much to food basic research, but do this in the context of Professor James Wood, security: “When a pig gets sick it diverts its finding improved intervention strategies,” he Professor Duncan Maskell and energy away from growth to fighting off the added. “Health standards and life expectancy Dr Laurence Tiley infection. This requires treatment with have gone up globally, and a large part of this For more information, please antibiotics and decreases the efficiency with is better nutrition. At many levels this means contact Professor Duncan Maskell which vegetable protein is converted into more meat and high-protein food. One key ([email protected]) at the kilograms of meat.” aim of our research is to provide the Department of Veterinary Medicine The goal is to create a single super- fundamental knowledge and clinical tools to (visit www.vet.cam.ac.uk/). vaccine that can be administered by nasal keep livestock healthy and our food safe.” 12 | Food security f o r e s e e r

p r o J e c t

The Foreseer tool is based on Sankey Foreseer of future resources diagrams, where the width of each line is proportional to the quantity of resource

An online tool will help users predict trade-offs between the global commodities of energy, water and land.

nderstanding how energy can be economic data and stopped short of tracing The team has had to start from first used efficiently is key to reducing the length of each energy chain from fuels all principles to understand how to build a map Ucarbon emissions and mitigating the way to consumers, halting instead at for land and water use. The first stage, future fuel and food shortages. But energy sectors. They gave you an idea of who to recently completed, focused on California, use is only part of the story. The link between blame for energy use but they didn’t provide USA, and Beijing, China, and the goal now is resources and final services – such as food, a basis for what you could change.” to expand this to other regions and then warmth, shelter and transport – is only really By demonstrating two years ago that worldwide. complete if water and land use is also it was indeed possible to create a global “Ultimately we want to be able to ask factored in. snapshot of energy flow from fuel to global questions such as: what are the Almost a year ago, nine experts from final service, Dr Allwood and colleague resource implications of rapid economic seven different departments across the Dr Jonathan Cullen realised that it might development and urbanisation in developing University set out to do precisely this. They also be feasible to turn this into a tool countries, and the expansion of mega-cities? reasoned that to understand the uncertainties with forecasting potential. How will changes in climate, population and ahead it is vitally important not only to “We could then ask ‘what if’ questions technology affect services such as food integrate models of energy, water and land such as what if car engines were to become provision? Making good decisions now, use but also to create a visualisation tool that twice as efficient?” Dr Allwood explained. “But including energy investment decisions, could be widely used, by industry, policy- to be truly predictive, mapping energy flow requires physically based predictions of makers, researchers and others, to understand alone is not enough. An increase in biofuel, future needs and pressures.” the consequences of how decisions today for instance, has implications for land and might play out in decades to come. water use, as well as fertiliser use, which itself is an energy-demanding product. Energy, Foreseer land and water are interlinked.” The Foreseer Project is funded through BP’s Energy Sustainability Challenge, which is Good decisions supporting projects in 12 leading research The key innovation of the Foreseer Project universities worldwide to explore some of the is integration. Access to the data, physical key issues that could shape future energy models and expertise were already in supply and demand. existence in departments across the At the heart of the Cambridge project is University; Foreseer has brought them the use of the Sankey diagram – a remarkably together for the first time. “It has been a intuitive visual interpretation of the quantity fascinating experience for each of the Dr Julian Allwood of resources and how they are consumed. Project members to expand from thinking For more information, please Although Sankey diagrams have been in about the variables that each of us are contact Dr Julian Allwood use for over a century for mapping energy familiar with to thinking about how they ([email protected]) at the flow, they have had limitations, as Dr Julian couple with other resources on a massive Department of Engineering or visit Allwood, who leads the Foreseer Project, scale. The Project has really got under www.lcmp.eng.cam.ac.uk/ explained: “Past diagrams were based on everybody’s skin.” Food security | 13 © i s t o c k p h

Far from being merely ‘dirt’, soil o t o . plays a fundamental role in c o M /

food production, water a n d r

availability and biodiversity. A e J s

z

new research programme aims e M d e

to safeguard its future g sustainable management. a

In soil we trust

ut simply, we cannot survive without Commission will help to define a policy for “Our contribution to the programme is soil. Its rich combination of minerals, sustainable management of soils, with a focused on working out the value of the soil Pcarbon-rich organic matter and water view to adopting a legally binding Soil ecosystem services: essentially, how much supports plant life. It also harbours its own Framework Directive, such as exists for air does soil matter when you take into account diverse ecosystem of millions of microbes and water. all of the functions it performs?” added and fauna that aerate the soil, cycle The Ecological Function and Dr Pascual. “Our task is to design cost- nutrients, decompose dead matter and Biodiversity Indicators in European Soils effective and socially fair policy instruments mineralise rock fragments around them. (EcoFINDERS) programme, which launched in for the conservation of soil biodiversity.” And although forests might most readily January 2011, brings together 22 institutional In effect, soil provides such a vast array spring to mind when considering the role of European research partners, including the of essential ecosystem services that the natural environment in carbon University of Cambridge, to formulate how maintaining its health has implications for exchange, what may not be so obvious is the best to manage the health of soil. food production, water availability, climate- vast carbon sink under our very feet. In fact, induced environmental change, resistance more carbon is stored in soil worldwide than Soil value to diseases and pests, and the regulation of is found in the atmosphere and the planet’s Given the demands made on soil, it can’t its own and above-ground biodiversity. biomass put together. look after itself. The goal of EcoFINDERS is to Dr Pascual believes that understanding Yet this fundamental resource is under design and implement soil strategies aimed the value of soil biodiversity conservation in threat from intensive agricultural practices at ensuring the sustainable use of soils, as relation to its function to deliver key and erosion. The catastrophe of the Dust Dr Unai Pascual, who leads the Cambridge ecosystem services that support human Bowl of the 1930s, when a combination of component of the programme, explained: wellbeing will open up a whole new way of severe drought and intensive farming “The general hypothesis is that changes in looking at soil and land management in caused dust storms across the American the diversity of microbes and fauna in soil Europe and elsewhere, especially in the prairies, shows the extent to which major indicate how healthy it is. EcoFINDERS is context of current global challenges such as damage can be inflicted. therefore characterising soil biodiversity and food security and climate change. Now, a major programme with determining how this links with soil €7 million funding from the European functions and ecosystem services.”

Food security, biodiversity and Biodiversity, Biomass and Food Security soil carbon Programme. “The workshop proceedings will aid development of a policy brief for how can incentives for soil carbon decision makers as to how we might contribute to food security and address this as a global priority. The biodiversity conservation? importance of maintaining soil carbon This key question was explored recently cannot be overstressed, both for the at a Cambridge Conservation Initiative widespread benefits it brings to (CCI) collaborative workshop led by the producing food and conserving UnEP World Conservation Monitoring biodiversity, and for its role as a carbon Centre (WCMC) and the University’s sink,” added Dr Ed Tanner of Plant Departments of Plant Sciences and Land Sciences. Dr Unai Pascual Economy. The workshop was funded by the CCI “While incentive measures that Strategic Initiative Fund and highlighted For more information, please encourage maintenance of forest carbon the unique capabilities of partners in contact Dr Unai Pascual are well developed, those for soil carbon CCI and other experts to review the ([email protected]) at the management are less so,” explained opportunities and challenges for Department of Land Economy or Alison Rosser of the UnEP-WCMC biodiversity and food supply. visit www.ecofinders.eu/ 14 | Food security © i s t o c k p h o t o . c Mathematical modelling is an o M / J a

important weapon in the s o n armoury against crop disease, as L u g plant epidemiologists o demonstrated when they turned their sights on root madness in sugar beet.

Modelling the root

Sugar beet provides around 30% of of crop disease the world’s sugar but yields are reduced by infestations of rhizomania

or sugar beet farmers, the appearance and Biological Sciences Research Council of passing on their quota as soon as their of yellowing patches in a field of sugar Professorial Fellow, “is the infection can be neighbours detect rhizomania. Fbeet is an alarming sight. It could asymptomatic and the pathogen, beet “The simulations show that the field- signal the presence of ‘root madness’, or necrotic yellow vein virus, can be readily scale approach fails to prevent invasion rhizomania, and a potential reduction in spread by a soil-borne fungus through the because, by the time the symptoms appear, their root sugar yield by 50–60%. movement of infested soil. In fact, by the the virus has already spread,” explained Diseases like rhizomania – which was time a farmer has identified symptoms in Professor Gilligan. “The farm-scale approach first identified in Italy almost 60 years ago their own fields they have unwittingly been however works well, so long as most farmers and now occurs in all the major sugar beet exporting the pathogen on shared sell their quota as soon as their neighbours growing areas of the world – are a frequent contractor’s agricultural machinery to their detect the disease. Interestingly, the model and recurring problem in crop production, neighbour’s fields.” shows that this strategy is robust to non- causing a reduction in potential food yields Strenuous efforts to contain the disease compliance – most but not all farmers have year upon year. adopted by the Ministry of Agriculture, to comply for it to work.” Breeding disease resistance and Fisheries and Food (MAFF, now Defra) The research on matching control with deploying pesticides have made remarkable involved annual surveys, destroying inherent epidemic scales was originally progress in crop protection. But such symptomatic plants on a field basis and funded by MAFF and British Sugar PLC. It strategies are not always feasible, prohibiting sugar beet cropping on affected now continues in the development of a particularly for emerging epidemics where fields. An additional, farm-scale measure was mathematical toolkit to predict the outcome appropriate methods may not yet exist. also introduced by the sugar beet industry: of control strategies to protect crops Another route, known as containment, is to any growers worried about the disease worldwide and safeguard food security. destroy the crop and prohibit its further status of their neighbour’s farm could growth on the infected farm. transfer their sugar beet quota to farmers in Monitoring the effectiveness of any kind regions of reduced risk. of crop protection is vitally important, and Both schemes were discontinued when mathematical models that track and predict a partially resistant variety of sugar beet disease, such as those created by Professor became available. However, the virus Chris Gilligan and his team in the continues to evolve, and an aggressive strain Department of Plant Sciences, are helping to has emerged that overcomes previously provide policy makers and regulators with resistant varieties of sugar beet, highlighting the basis on which to make crucial strategic the importance of the continuing decisions. development of resistant strains and of Sugar beet rhizomania is among the evaluating the effectiveness of control many plant diseases that the Cambridge strategies. scientists have modelled. Their work, in close The mathematical model developed by collaboration with government policy the Gilligan group looked at the relative makers at the Department for Environment, success of field-scale versus farm-scale Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), has helped containment, using data from the initial both to gauge the effectiveness of infestation of rhizomania in East Anglia in containment strategies for this potentially 2000. Professor chris Gilligan devastating disease and to curb the Their simulations were able to predict For more information, please potential for a future epidemic. the relationship between the effectiveness contact Professor Chris Gilligan of containment and the behaviour of ([email protected]) at the Keeping ahead of the virus growers, both in terms of how aware they Department of Plant Sciences “The difficulty with rhizomania,” explained are of the disease state of their neighbours’ (www.plantsci.cam.ac.uk/). Professor Gilligan, who is a Biotechnology fields and how risk averse they are in terms Food security | 15 © n e s t L Nature’s é value to business

A programme convening business leaders and policy makers is helping to identify the value to business of nature – and the step changes needed to build food security – as its co-Directors explain.

or many years businesses have been Responsible farming and production practices throughout the value chain is helping Nestlé, one of the aware of the impact of their activities companies involved in the cPSL programme, to optimise its supply chain Fon the environment. But far less is understood about the value to business of Many natural resources, including water and Solutions lie in devising new business the goods and services that nature provides. soil, are already under great stress, and models that can provide nutritious, safe and Yet, increasingly, this dependency is security of supply and access to materials are affordable food to over nine billion people becoming a prominent issue, particularly for becoming a major risk for companies. by 2050, using less land, fewer inputs, with those in the food and agricultural sectors Another area under investigation is the less waste and a lower environmental who rely directly on natural resources for evolving landscape of risk and opportunity impact, and in ways that are socially and their commodities and products. for business generated by the intensifying economically sustainable. Essential to Over the past year, a unique project – pressures on ecosystem services and natural success will be supportive national and the Cambridge Natural Capital Programme capital. Many of the companies brought global policy frameworks. at the Cambridge Programme for together by the programme realise that such The power of such a University-based Sustainability Leadership (CPSL) – has risks and opportunities are poorly programme is its ability to convene developed innovative and practical understood at a business level. The tools influential business leaders and policy recommendations for the corporate sector, they have developed in the collaboratories makers and to offer unique collaborative helping to identify risks, opportunities and have helped them devise better strategies research opportunities to tackle these step changes in the face of growing and anticipate likely policy responses by complex problems and devise practical pressures on the ecosystems and natural government to these risks. solutions. capital that underpin the global economy. On the other hand, investors are The programme is one of a number assessing risks and opportunities operating developed by CPSL over 20 years that draw within an economic model that does not on the leading research and networks of the take account of the natural limits to growth. University to help business leaders address The programme is examining how to the critical global challenges they face today. accelerate the mainstreaming of natural capital into investment decisions as well as Risks and opportunities into the creation of new investment Launched in April 2010, the cross-sector opportunities so that we live off the ‘natural programme convenes 20 companies with interest’ rather than the natural capital of our global reach, including ASDA Wal-Mart, resource base. Cargill, Kraft Foods, Nestlé, Olam Outcomes of these business International and Unilever, who recognise collaboratories will feed into international the benefits of working collaboratively and policy processes, including Rio +20, the learning from the experience of others. United Nations Conference on Sustainable An initial food security roundtable with Development next year in Brazil. businesses leaders clarified where CPSL could add value, and four ‘collaboratories’ Frameworks for food security For more information about CPSL’s have been created with the intention of At the heart of ecosystem and natural capital Cambridge natural Capital developing practical actions and informing decline are constraints to food security – the Programme, please contact its public policy. ability of the current global food system to co-Directors, Martin Roberts One area that requires a practical deliver sufficient food within the carrying ([email protected]) solution is how to ‘re-tune’ retail and capacity of the planet. Looking ahead, the and Margaret Adey manufacturing supply chains to share one programme will focus on helping business ([email protected]) at planet’s worth of resources, and how to and policy makers to understand the system CPSL (www.cpsl.cam.ac.uk/). include local communities in the equation. shifts needed to overcome these constraints. 16 | Food security L a r s

h o L b e c h

Farming and the fate of

Some wildlife, such as the chocolate-backed wild nature Kingfisher above, will only survive if intact natural habitats are protected

arming is the greatest extinction threat A dual challenge As the drive to increase food to birds, mammals, plants and insects, From the moment that humans first began production gathers pace, Fand widespread land clearing, transforming land from wild nature, we have conservation scientists suggest irrigation and chemical treatments have been a direct competitor with biodiversity, that reconciling food security profoundly affected wild species and as a great many studies measuring the rate habitats the world over. But why should we with protecting biodiversity of species extinction in relation to land care about biodiversity when the necessity development have shown. might require unexpected of meeting an expected doubling of global However, as Professor Rhys Green, also solutions. food demand is only decades away? from the Department of Zoology, explained: The stark reality, as conservation “It’s now not enough to count how many scientist Professor Andrew Balmford species are disappearing or to understand explained, is that biodiversity is not a luxury, why ecosystems are collapsing. We need to it’s a necessity for human life: “As well as work out what kinds of farming provide the being a vital source for many people of food food we need yet give the best prospect for and fuel, wild nature is crucial for every one minimising biodiversity losses.” of us in mitigating climate change, The real question therefore is what can regulating water flows, and buffering people be done to tackle both problems in tandem? from the impact of storms and floods.” Professor Green, together with Professor “World agriculture developed and Balmford and others, came up with a model flourished during a period of climate (published in Science in 2005) that, when the stability,” he added. “We don’t yet know how right data are collected, can be used to our current agricultural systems will be answer this question. They looked at the affected by climate change but my guess is impact on biodiversity of two potential cambridge conservation that they will be more sensitive than we solutions – land sparing and land sharing – Initiative realise. For me, this uncertainty underscores and asked, theoretically, which would be Launched in 2007, CCI is a the importance for the future of farming of best for wild nature. collaboration between six agriculture having least possible impact on “With land sparing, the idea is to farm departments of the University of what remains of nature.” the productive region as intensively as Cambridge and nine leading Professor Balmford, who helps lead the possible, without damaging areas away from conservation organisations based in Conservation Science Group in the farmland, and then to set aside other land the Cambridge area. It represents a Department of Zoology, advocates thinking for wild nature,” explained Professor Green. critical mass of expertise at the smart from the start. “It’s vitally important to “With land sharing, agricultural practices interface of research and education, integrate biodiversity concerns into the encourage wildlife through retention of policy and practice, for the inevitable expansion in agriculture, hedgerows, patches of native vegetation conservation of biodiversity and especially in developing countries and and fewer pesticides. This usually means ecosystems. regions where crop farming is likely to lower yields and therefore more land is increase the most,” he said, “and to do this at needed to grow a given amount of produce.” For more information, please visit an early stage, not when it’s too late to save “The argument for land sparing is rarely www.conservation.cam.ac.uk/ remaining wild habitats and the species that made by conservationists – it’s more depend on them.” commonly advocated in the agriculture Food security | 17 literature,” he added. “Yet our mathematical identify where croplands are expanding most model suggested that land sparing might and where there is likely to be greatest allow more species to persist.” conflict with conservation priorities. This project is a collaboration between In search of data the Department of Zoology, BirdLife To find out if land sparing was indeed a better International, the Royal Society for the option for productivity and wildlife required a Protection of Birds (RSPB) and the UNEP combination of data that had never been World Conservation Monitoring Centre – all collected before. of which are members of the Cambridge Measurements were needed of the Conservation Initiative (see panel) – with vital abundance of individual species in matched seed funding provided by the Isaac Newton landscapes that vary only in the degree of Trust. agricultural development – from wild nature, “The new project is a chance to through wildlife-friendly farming, to high- understand how to resolve trade-offs yield intensive farming – as well as, crucially, between conservation and agriculture, and of the agricultural yield of these same to make wise choices about where and how landscapes. we farm,” explained Professor Balmford. “Only “We know quite a lot about the impact of then can we hope to meet increased food different landscapes on wildlife, but this can demands at the least cost to the other be misleading without information on yields species with which we share our planet.” as well,” said Dr Ben Phalan, who for his b J ö graduate studies spent 15 months in Ghana r n

s surveying wildlife and measuring agricultural c h u yields and profits, while fellow graduate L t e - student Malvika Onial did the same in h e r b northern India. r ü g g e n “Our studies suggest that if we want to reconcile biodiversity and food production then we might well be better separating them than trying to integrate them on the same land.”

Although agricultural change is an important driver almost everywhere, the research focused on developing countries because these regions are home to some of the largest concentrations of biodiversity and also to the most rapid changes in human populations and agricultural practices. “By quantifying how species are affected Dr Ben Phalan conducting a point count for birds in by increasing yield, we can work out whether a mature oil palm plantation, Ghana it’s better to spread farming out over a larger area to dilute its impact or to concentrate production in existing croplands, allowing the protection of natural habitats such as rainforest,” said Dr Phalan. More recently, the team has also begun to look at other regions of the world such as more-developed countries.

Smarter thinking “Inevitably, there will be unease about From left: Professor Rhys advocating high-intensity food production,” added Professor Balmford. “It will be Green, Professor Andrew important to look carefully at practices that Balmford, Dr Ben Phalan and have impact beyond the farm – use of fossil Malvika Onial fuels, fertilisers, water abstraction, pollution, For more information, please contact social concerns and so on. But our studies Professor Andrew Balmford suggest that if we want to reconcile ([email protected]) or biodiversity and food production then we Professor Rhys Green might well be better separating them than ([email protected]) at the trying to integrate them on the same land.” Department of zoology The first steps in using the information to (www.zoo.cam.ac.uk/). Professor inform future agricultural practices have Green is also a Principal Research already begun. Dr Phalan has embarked on a Biologist at the RSPB. broad-sweep analysis of the tropics to 18 | Knowledge exchange © i s t

Academia makes a considerable o c k p and valued contribution to exploding the h o t o

society that goes far beyond . c o M

commercialisation of applied / ivory tower myth M i c research, as Professor Alan h e a L Hughes, co-author of the first o f i a c in-depth study of all UK h r university –business interactions, a explains.

hen people think about how academia links with external Worganisations they often think in terms of commercialisation of research. But the results of a large-scale survey of academics across all disciplines in every UK university, and a parallel survey of all sectors of UK business, tell a very different story. The surveys were carried out by the Centre for Business Research (CBR) at Cambridge Judge Business School as part of a research initiative funded by the Economic and Social Research Council and the respective higher education funding councils of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The results were finalised last year and have now been interrogated in greater detail, and supported by a set of detailed case studies, for the arts and humanities – a group of disciplines conventionally given little emphasis in relation to discussions of the socio-economic impact of university activity. A recently published report of this latest research, which was funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), explodes some of the myths surrounding the alleged ivory tower isolation of university academics, to reveal the wide, but often hidden, impact of universities outside of academia. They also show the way in which universities can act as a ‘public space’ within which a variety of initially informal interactions can develop into a broad spectrum of fruitful interactions with the public, private and third sectors.

UK-wide survey of all academics Over 22,000 academics responded to the survey – the largest survey in the world to date to cover academic involvement with external organisations – as well as over 2,500 businesses of all sectors and sizes. The results permit a detailed mapping of the patterns of interactions of academics with external organisations in the public, private and community sectors, together with an in-depth examination of private sector business views of their relationships with academics. For the UK academic community as a whole, the survey results make it very plain that commercialisation activities in the sense of licensing, patenting or spin-out companies are a very small part of the overall knowledge exchange spectrum. Knowledge exchange | 19

Compared with 5% and 7% of UK Academics from the arts and humanities initially, not driven by strictly instrumental academics, respectively, who report having therefore emerge as highly connected with and commercial needs. Universities provide licensed research or are carrying out the UK economy and society. Moreover, an environment to nurture interactions and patenting activity, over 30% report being these interactions are regarded by the potential links from which a wide variety of involved in standard-setting forums with academics involved as strongly supportive other connections, including strictly external organisations or are directly of scholarship and represent a two-way commercial ones, may develop. employed in employee training and student complementary interaction with external placement with external organisations. organisations. Nearly 90% attend events such as The notion therefore that knowledge “The notion that knowledge conferences involving external exchange is an activity driven solely by exchange is an activity driven organisations. These people-related commercial and pecuniary interests is solely by commercial and activities dwarf knowledge exchange mis-founded – for most academics in the through direct commercialisation. arts and humanities, the main impact of pecuniary interests is In addition, problem-solving activities, connecting with others is complementary to mis-founded.” such as involvement in research consortia, their research and their teaching. prototyping, testing and, in particular, the Even within a narrow commercialisation provision of informal advice, are between perspective, a disaggregation of the arts and five and 10 times more important than humanities to distinguish the creative arts direct commercialisation. Finally, around a and media from other humanities reveals third of academics are involved in lectures that the former displays connection for the community, school projects and the characteristics as deep as other disciplines provision of a wide variety of public and with considerable private sector and exhibitions and arts activities for the commercial interactions. community. The business survey responses also The academic survey also revealed that reveal a pattern of interactions with the external organisations involved in these academics that spans all disciplines and academic interactions extended beyond the stretches beyond patenting and licensing. private sector to include a rich set of Businesses frequently use multiple interactions with the public sector, and with disciplinary sources including the arts and a wide range of charitable community and humanities to address a wide range of local and regional organisations. activities spanning marketing and In terms of the constraints on organisational change and which go beyond knowledge exchange between the private a focus on technology development. sector and academia, the conventional wisdom that constraints are caused by University as a public space cultural differences, conflict over intellectual Many academics from the arts and property and differences in time periods humanities (and those from other over which research should be carried out is disciplines) do not connect with external Hidden Connections: Knowledge exchange not supported by evidence. Instead, the organisations because it is not considered between the arts and humanities and the private, principal constraint reported by businesses necessary for their research or teaching. Two public and third sectors by Alan hughes, Michael Kitson, Jocelyn Probert, Anna Bullock and Isobel was their own internal capacity to manage striking findings of the research in this Milner was published by the AhRc and cBR in academic relationships effectively. From the respect are, first, that the connections which May 2011. academics’ point of view, it is the pressure of are made are most frequently initiated by time and the need to manage pressures to the external organisations that academics combine external relationships (which were partner and, second, that they are not frequently seen to be positively related to initially instigated via technology transfer research and teaching activities) with the offices. demands of career prospects (which are For knowledge exchange to be effective dominated by academic publication). and provide benefits to all partners, the development of mutual understanding and Arts and humanities management of expectations are crucial. The overall survey includes 3,650 responses Where there are areas in which improved from academics in fields within the scope of connectivity would support both academic the AHRC, including English, linguistics and pursuits and wider social and economic modern languages, classics, history, objectives, knowledge exchange can philosophy, architecture, cultural studies, therefore be best improved by mechanisms and the creative arts and media. that can support informal interaction, the An analysis of patenting and licensing discovery of mutual interests and the reveals that this is, with the exception of the subsequent development and management Professor Alan hughes creative arts and media, a relatively low of relationships. For more information, please contact level of activity for these academics. Maintaining a strong pattern of Professor Alan Hughes However, once we move beyond this knowledge exchange activities is closely ([email protected]), Director of narrow perspective to include knowledge connected to what may be termed the the Centre for Business Research at exchange that spans people-based, ‘public space’ role of universities: a forum in the Cambridge Judge Business School problem-solving and community-orientated which a wide variety of individuals and and member of the Prime Minister’s activities, the arts and humanities display as organisations can interact and develop Council for Science and Technology. rich and diverse a set of connections as relationships. Some of these relationships A report on the full academic survey other disciplines, and a particularly wide may lead to a commercial and contractual can be found at www.cbr.cam.ac.uk/ range of third sector and community stage, but their development depends on pdf/AcademicSurveyReport.pdf interactions. the ability to connect in a way that is, at least 20 | Preview

eruptions that shook the world

f you thought the Icelandic volcano was volcanic rocks themselves, as well as In a new book, Dr Clive bad – think again. According to a new from archaeology, historical documents, Oppenheimer sifts the evidence Istudy, the recent ash clouds that mythology and ancient climate records. grounded aircraft and marooned holiday- “What we need is a reality check – to see how far claims that makers were “just a taste” of the widespread a forensic test to see how far claims volcanic catastrophes change the air pollution, public health problems and about catastrophes changing the world world hold up and whether agricultural crises that future, bigger really hold up,” Oppenheimer said. lessons from past eruptions can eruptions could bring. Oppenheimer believes that volcanoes help governments prepare for These are just a few of the conclusions of remain widely misunderstood. “There is what, rather ironically, claims to be a “non- a lot to learn about volcanoes,” he said. future events. catastrophist” new book by the University “They affect our lives in so many ways, of Cambridge volcanologist Dr Clive even if we don’t live near one. ” With, Oppenheimer, entitled Eruptions that Shook according to one estimate, 10% of the the World . world’s population and at least 12 major It explores both the nature and history cities now located within range of a of volcanoes, showing how eruptions that volcano, a more accurate perspective is we may think of as disastrous for their local needed on what they can do, so that communities actually had dramatic rational plans can be drawn up in consequences for the Earth’s climate, and preparation for future events. therefore sometimes for societies on the “The Japanese earthquake, tsunami and other side of the world. knock-on effects at the Fukushima nuclear Volcanic activity, Oppenheimer argues, plant show that cascading failures can have was at least part of the reason for numerous massive impacts on societies,” he added. major events in world history – among them “The problem for governments is that the the collapse of Minoan civilisation, medieval potential scale of the damage really big bubonic plague, the 19th-century prairie eruptions can cause is difficult to consider trail migrations to the American West; and against the improbability of them occurring. even the rise of anti-Semitism in Europe. We need effective tools for making informed That may not sound particularly decisions about how to prepare. This means non-catastrophist, but his concern is with deducing as much as we can from past sifting through real evidence – from the eruptions.” Preview | 21 e x

f Kilauea Volcano, hawaii, one of the world’s most o r active volcanoes; in March 2011, a new vent d y

/ opened when the floor of the Pu'u O'o crater f L i

c (shown here) collapsed k r

Death and disaster And in 1815, global cooling caused by Beyond the geological information proffered 30 megatonnes of sulphur emitted from an “We need effective tools for by volcano sites, much of the evidence eruption on Sumbawa, Indonesia, led to the making informed decisions comes from natural records like sulphate infamous ‘year without a summer’ of 1816 in about how to prepare. This both Europe and the eastern USA. In the found in the polar ice cores and tree rings. means deducing as much as we Worryingly, this points to a number of as- latter, the failure of crops in places like yet-undiscovered eruptions – one as recently Connecticut sparked a wave of migrations can from past eruptions.” as 1809. The largest sulphur fallout of the westwards. In Europe, where the Napoleonic past 7,000 years was in 1259. Nobody knows Wars had just ended, an economic crisis which volcano was responsible. occurred. Amid the riots and looting were a This evidence also shows why the number of pogroms – violent reprisals repercussions of volcanoes are felt far against Jews. They were the first in an beyond the impact zone. The large eruptions ongoing chain of such events that reached of the past few millennia produced huge their final, terrible conclusion with the rise of clouds of sulphurous dust, which caused the Nazis. dramatic climatic swings. One case, in 1783, shows what a bigger Emergency planning eruption in Iceland could do. That year, an Such catastrophic scenarios may seem eruption took place at Laki that was 200 unlikely today, but, Oppenheimer argues, times the size of the 2010 example. It volcanoes could still wreak havoc if we don’t emitted 122 megatonnes of sulphur dioxide, prepare for larger eruptions. A Laki-type wiped out a fifth of the country’s population event in Iceland now would do far more than and coincided strikingly with tens of upset a few indignant tourists; its sulphur thousands of deaths in England and France. cloud could add to the air pollution in The reason for the scale of the modern European cities and produce a catastrophe may be linked to the sulphuric serious public health crisis. Then there is the cloud that spread over Europe. Documented possibility of a super-eruption, which would at the time as a mysterious ‘haze’, this cloud cause a major humanitarian disaster. The last initially interacted with an area of high one we know about happened 26,000 years pressure over the continent, causing a heat ago. Oppenheimer estimates that there is wave that killed thousands. A very severe roughly a 1/500 chance of one recurring in winter then followed – the result of a the next century – odds long enough for temperature drop as the sulphuric particles governments to ignore, but short enough to in the atmosphere reflected solar radiation cause serious concern. that should have been reaching the Earth His study recommends that international back into space. First, the Thames and other organisations already exist that could rivers froze. Then, as the snow melted, there introduce measures like spot traffic bans or Eruptions That Shook The World by Dr clive was widespread flooding. the distribution of dust masks in a repeat of Oppenheimer is published by cambridge University Press These changes in the climate resulted in the Laki eruption. For those who find dramatic crop and livestock failures and the themselves in the immediate vicinity of a spread of disease. The death rate in England volcano, however, Oppenheimer says spiked in both the summer of 1783 and the evacuation is the only real solution – adding a n

following winter; an estimated 25,000 that governments should consider creating n a

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people lost their lives overall. and maintaining plans for this in potential a r f

Laki is just one example of volcanoes disaster zones. o r that have disastrous consequences far away. In spite of that, however, his conclusion d An eruption 3,600 years ago entombed the is oddly optimistic: “Humankind has yet to island of Santorini in the Mediterranean and, run into the buffers as the result of a volcanic as debris hit the ocean, caused a tsunami eruption and may have learned to adapt and that contaminated farmland elsewhere. benefit from them in the long term. As the Within a few generations, the Minoan global population heads towards 10 billion, civilisation that had dominated the region the human track record shows that we can collapsed. manage the consequences of eruptions with In 536, a still-unidentified volcano again resolve, flexibility and creativity – if we caused a climate swing and an agrarian prepare properly.” Dr clive Oppenheimer crisis. It is probably no coincidence that the For more information, please contact first pandemic of bubonic plague happened Reporting by Tom Kirk Dr Clive Oppenheimer at the same time – rats would have ([email protected]) abandoned the dying fields and headed for at the Department of Geography man-made grain stores where they spread (www.geog.cam.ac.uk/). the bacterium. 22 | Features r e p r o d u c e d

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Marriage inventory of hanss hürning and Barbara ne cabbage-spoon, a new dung- chart the history of how poor economies herrenmann from the Württemberg village of barrow, two badger-skins and a improve living standards. They hope that Auingen, 20 February 1682 ‘Ohalf share of an old pregnant understanding the rise in human wellbeing in mare…’ – so read the belongings of Hanss European economies over past centuries Hürning on the occasion of his marriage in could hold lessons for developing economies 300 years of 1682 to Barbara, owner of ‘nine white today. bonnets, a new scarlet over-bodice, a small spinning-wheel and a three-year-old red- Reconstructing history list-making brown cow.’ Professor Ogilvie first stumbled across the Many of us today would find it incredibly Württemberg inventories as a graduate difficult to list absolutely everything we own, student 30 years ago: “Ledger upon ledger but in the southwest German territory of contained lists that in isolation were A collection of personal Württemberg until 1900 such lists were fascinating but, together, offered an inventories spanning three drawn up over hundreds of years for most incredible community-wide compendium of centuries is helping researchers to newly-married brides and bridegrooms and who owned what, and how this changed unlock information about how bereaved widows and widowers. from marriage to death and with successive poor European societies in the From clothing to kitchen goods, land to generations.” luxuries, the entire contents of homes and past improved their living Although inventories survive elsewhere, businesses were inventoried for inheritance those in Württemberg are exceptionally standards, and could hold lessons purposes, down to the last oaken water-vat detailed, covering marriage and death, for developing economies today. or sack of dried apple slices. And, remarkably, women and men, poor and rich, mansions many thousands of these Württemberg and mousetraps. inventories survive today. For the past three years, the Cambridge Now a team of researchers, led by researchers have been painstakingly Professor Sheilagh Ogilvie, an economic examining each handwritten document, historian at the University of Cambridge, and compiling its contents in a vast database, and funded by the Economic and Social Research carrying out multivariate statistical analyses. Council, is systematically studying these In so doing, the team is reconstructing 300 unrivalled documents for the first time to years of economic history, from 1600 to 1900, Features | 23 1 M . 1 u

1 for two Württemberg communities – the Ogilvie. “Social norms about the appropriate s ,

e i n u v M village of Auingen on the Schwäbische Alb quantity, quality and style of consumption for . n

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1 and the small town of Wildberg in the Black particular social groups were enforced with

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r Forest. In 2013, the completed database will sumptuary penalties and public shaming, / t 1 t 3 e 6

M be deposited in the UK Data Archive, which is even for inviting ‘too many’ guests to your : p b h e r o open to public access. wedding or wearing excessively wide g t o f o g What really brings the inventories alive is trousers.” [see panel] r L k a p c information generated by a previous project, This reduced people’s ability to buy new h u : L a t u n led by Professor Ogilvie and funded by the goods and their incentive to work more r d e r ,

w e Leverhulme Trust, which created a full hours to afford them. The German a a s L p d demographic reconstruction of the same two Industrious Revolution was held back until r e a n e b

f communities. Family trees, fertility and guilds, merchant associations and sumptuary u c c k h e mortality are linked to occupational laws broke down, after about 1800. , Masters of the tanners guild; guilds such as this background, wealth, farm size, household For the Cambridge project, this means benefited their own members but blocked structure, literacy and social networks, and that small changes in what people owned – entrepreneurial activities by outsiders now, through the new project, to individuals’ even the first coffee cup to appear in belongings. someone’s inventory – are significant To date, 28,000 handwritten folios have because they could indicate the beginnings The wrong trousers been analysed, representing 460,000 of an Industrious Revolution. how would you like the government separate items of property and their “We encountered our first coffee cup in or your neighbours to tell you how monetary values. For over 3,000 individuals, an inventory of 1718,” said Professor Ogilvie. to dress? the researchers now know who they were “After that we expected that a fashion for and what they owned, their gender, age and coffee and its associated equipment would Traditional societies often have marital status, place of origin, occupation, take off, but instead there was no further informal customs about what people credit relationships and office-holding, mention until 1733. We have just found our (especially women) are allowed to whether or not they could sign their name, third coffee cup in 1739. We know that they wear. But some go further and and who were their family members and become common by the 1750s so we are on actually pass laws about it. This is heirs. tenterhooks for the next couple of months what happened in many parts of while we work our way through the 1740s.” pre-industrial Europe. German states, An ‘Industrious’ Revolution in the With their gigantic database at their for example, passed at least 1,350 making? fingertips, the team can ask fine-grained laws regulating clothing between This wealth of information is opening a questions such as who started using coffee 1244 and 1816. window on how market consumption affects cups, calico dresses, or any other trend. Were You might think such laws were the economy. In fact, it’s the most they rich or poor, educated or illiterate, male unenforceable. But in early modern comprehensive attempt yet to investigate or female, locals or migrants? The team can Germany they were enforced. In 1662, the theory of the ‘Industrious’ Revolution – trace how rapidly any trend spread and for instance, a Württemberg the idea that the Industrial Revolution was whether – as the Industrious Revolution community court reprimanded an preceded by a time when a growing desire predicts – it coincided with other household unmarried weaver’s son “on account of for consumer goods spurred changes in changes. his very wide trousers, a fashion that it households’ time allocation and productivity. Tracing such changes in history is is unfitting for him to wear”, fined him “Aspirations for the latest fashions, important for understanding present-day about two weeks’ wages, and warned furnishings and stimulants motivated people developing economies, as Professor Ogilvie him that “if he should again put on to shift time from leisure and do-it-yourself to explained: “We think that household-level trousers of this fashion, they shall, by income-earning work, creating a virtuous changes in consumer behaviour and literacy virtue of the Princely Command, be circle,” explained Professor Ogilvie. “More are good predictors of economic confiscated.” work meant more earnings, more earnings development, lower child mortality, a better In 1708, another Württemberg meant people could buy more consumer position for women, and higher human village court forbade Magdalena goods, and this spurred producers to wellbeing. Now we have a powerful tool to Schöttlin, a local weaver’s wife, to innovate and expand.” describe these changes accurately – and to wear “her excessively large Up to now, the Industrious Revolution explain them.” neckerchief, which she is accustomed theory has relied almost exclusively on to wearing above her station.” When English and Dutch records before c. 1750. But Magdalena went on wearing it, she many European economies – such as was summoned before the court and Germany – were much poorer and slower- fined the equivalent of 11 days’ wages growing than the north Atlantic seaboard. for a local maidservant. What held Germany back? Professor Dress laws couldn’t totally stop Ogilvie’s past research has pointed towards people from doing new things, of the dominance of guilds and merchant course. But they increased the costs associations in resisting changes that and risks of participating in an threatened their monopolies. Guilds erected Industrious Revolution – especially for barriers against even the simplest women, young people and the poor. It commercial innovations such as peddling or may not be a coincidence that in rural craftwork that brought goods cheaply Professor Sheilagh Ogilvie England and The netherlands, the to poor consumers. Governments and elites For more information, please contact ‘miracle economies’ of pre-industrial tried to control what ordinary people could Professor Sheilagh Ogilvie Europe, dress laws were abolished consume. ([email protected]) at around 1600, just before their “It might be argued that such the Faculty of Economics or visit Industrious Revolutions really began prohibitions were merely futile gestures, www.econ.cam.ac.uk/Ogilvie_ESRC/ to take off. were it not for the fact that people at the index.html time took them quite seriously,” said Professor 24 | Features

Why is heart disease increasing at a greater rate in South Asia than in any other region globally? Large-scale population studies in Pakistan and Bangladesh aim to discover the basis of a little-studied public health problem of epidemic proportions. high-risk hearts: a South Asian epidemic

ardiovascular disease (CVD) is the Now, two population studies jointly led most common cause of death and by Professor Danesh and other researchers Cdisability worldwide. For South at the Department of Public Health and Asians, though, this global killer poses an Primary Care hope to find some answers. even more sinister threat. Over the past With 35,000 participants, the Pakistan Risk of three decades, the incidence of heart attacks Myocardial Infarction Study (PROMIS) is the and strokes among South Asians has risen most powerful study so far to search for steeply. Today, South Asians, even those biological and other risk factors for CVD living in other countries, are considerably among Pakistanis. And, despite commencing more likely to die prematurely from the only in January 2011, the Bangladesh Risk of disease than are other ethnic groups. Acute Vascular Events (BRAVE) study already Moreover, the increase appears to be exceeds any previous study in scale. unrelenting. The identification of ‘classic’ risk factors PROMIS such as blood fats, blood pressure, diabetes “Pakistan is a country of 187 million people, and smoking has contributed to a decline in yet fewer than 1,000 patients have been CVD-related deaths in high-income assessed in previous epidemiological studies countries. Although the same risk factors apply to South Asians, it seems likely that of heart disease,” said Dr Danish Saleheen, they may be affected by additional, as-yet- who leads PROMIS. “When I was a medical unrecognised, factors. student in Pakistan, infrastructure was “The study of vascular disease among lacking to conduct large-scale genetic people living in South Asia has been investigations in that region. Moreover, there comparatively neglected,” said Professor were not any instruments or studies that John Danesh, Head of the Department of could specifically investigate lifestyle and Public Health and Primary Care. “South dietary exposures which are very specific to Asians number 1.5 billion people worldwide, South Asia in relation to conditions like heart yet until recently there have been few attacks and stroke.” powerful studies tailored to evaluate the He began a project with colleagues in distinctive genetic, biochemical and lifestyle Pakistan to investigate what it might be risk factors affecting this group.” about South Asians that makes them more Features | 25 o e d vulnerable to the development of heart i p u s diseases. Were local dietary practices, such Measures to strengthen Indian public health p h i n as the use of ghee as cooking fat, to blame? A simple piece of software built by PhD student Raghupathy Anchala could, if x

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Or the many non-cigarette-based ways of successful, “prevent the death of millions of people around the world ”. –

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– consuming tobacco, including chewing, t h e sniffing and ingesting? Or cultural habits In countries with significant public health challenges and few resources, advice

J w d such as marriage between first cousins? received at the first point of contact with a healthcare professional can be literally b a n Or environmental influences such as life-saving. And when it relates to a public health problem as serious as the rise in / f L i c contaminants in food and water? CVD currently facing South Asia, then the advice could have a major impact on k r After Dr Saleheen moved to Cambridge public health. in 2006 as a Cambridge Commonwealth Raghupathy Anchala, a PhD student in the Department of Public Health and Trust scholar, the study design was Primary Care, is currently in India trialling his Decision Support System, which aims to optimised, long-term funding was secured, help physicians provide optimal care to hypertensive patients, and is based on Indian and full-scale recruitment commenced guidelines. The program guides the physician through which physical measurements under the joint leadership of Professor and lifestyle factors to record, alerts as to whether the patient is at risk for CVD, and Danesh. It now recruits patients with heart suggests lifestyle and drug management advice to improve the patient’s health. disease, stroke or diabetes at a rate of “If this intervention works and is cost-effective, it will provide a very adequate 10,000 per year from 13 institutes across means to prevent the death of millions of people around the world, especially in Pakistan through the Centre for lower and middle income countries,” said Dr Oscar Franco, who is supervising the Non-Communicable Diseases in Karachi, research. whose current Director is Dr Saleheen. The project is part of a wider Anglo-Indian initiative to bolster public health The study is poised to yield a harvest of training and research in India. Despite substantial economic progress, India faces a novel findings. For example, it has recently chronic inadequacy of public healthcare systems and trained professionals; in 2009, a contributed to the discovery of five genes £5 million initiative funded by the Wellcome Trust was launched to remedy the for coronary artery disease and five separate situation. Professor Danesh is the initiative’s lead investigator from the University of genes for type 2 diabetes, with the findings Cambridge. published in Nature Genetics . Other detailed Over a five-year period, the partnership between the Public Health Foundation of analyses are in progress with the support of India (PHFI) and 14 UK institutions, including Cambridge, aims to train over 70 public more than £10 million in research funding health researchers like Raghupathy. On their return to India, the researchers will from the US National Institutes of Health, provide the faculty for up to eight new public health institutes across India. Wellcome Trust and British Heart Foundation. For more information, please contact the UK-PhFI on-site co-ordinator, Perhaps where PROMIS will have its Dr Adam Butterworth ([email protected]) or Dr Oscar Franco greatest potential impact will be the ([email protected]). evaluation of local risk factors that can be modified. “We are beginning to identify distinctive factors which increase the risk of, or protect against, heart diseases,” said “Because of the astonishing rate Dr Saleheen. “For instance, consumption of ghee and indigenous types of tobacco, at which patients are arriving... including ‘naswar’, increases the risk of heart medical officers are recruiting attack. Through PROMIS, we are now able to three times as many patients as pinpoint the contribution of these factors in was anticipated.” a more precise manner than ever before.”

BRAVE Of all South Asian countries, Bangladesh Bangladeshi and UK collaborators with probably has the highest rates of CVD and equal intellectual partnership,” said yet is the least studied. Dr Rajiv Chowdhury, Dr Chowdhury, who jointly leads the study who is himself from Bangladesh, explained with Dr Emanuele Di Angelantonio and the severity of the situation: “In the late Professor Danesh. “The biorepository will be 1990s it was estimated that there would be used to test current and future hypotheses a 100% increase in CVD across South Asia by relating to potential risk factors to help 2020. But, when you look at Bangladesh, shape local and global cardiopreventive there has already been a 3,500% increase. In policies.” the global combat against CVD, Bangladesh Dr Chowdhury is certain that, as in is a country ‘missing in action’.” Pakistan, crucial risk factors will be Gates Scholar Dr Chowdhury leads the discovered: “Bangladesh has the highest rate BRAVE study, which began seven months of urbanisation and population density in From left: Dr emanuele Di ago in pilot form in readiness for a South Asia, and is facing the worst threats of Angelantonio, Dr Danish subsequent large-scale study. Because of climate change globally. Factors associated Saleheen, Dr Rajiv chowdhury the astonishing rate at which patients are with such extraordinary circumstances may and Professor John Danesh arriving at the National Institute of have influenced the population’s massive For more information, please Cardiovascular Diseases in Dhaka, medical shift in epidemiology towards increased contact Professor John Danesh officers are recruiting three times as many CVD. Equally, it could be linked to ([email protected]) patients as was anticipated, and the study suboptimal nutrition, widespread at the Department of Public will reach 1,000 by the end of this year. environmental contaminants such as arsenic Health and Primary Care “One important objective is to build an in ground water and plants, or specific (www.phpc.cam.ac.uk/). epidemiological resource – the first in vulnerabilities in the genetic or metabolic Bangladesh – to be shared between the make-up that have yet to be discovered.” 26 | Features t h e

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Island of broken figurines

Why were Bronze Age figurines smashed, transported and buried in shallow pits on the Aegean island of Keros? new research sheds light on a 4,500-year-old mystery.

n a June morning in 1963, Colin a pair of thighs, a face – all jumbled together hundred metres further south that also Renfrew stepped from a caïque boat with broken bowls and pots. seemed to be a Special Deposit and of the Oonto the scrub-covered Aegean When the ‘Keros Hoard’, a collection tiny steep-sided islet of Dhaskalio that lay 80 island of Keros on the basis of a tip-off. In widely believed to be part of the looted metres offshore from Keros. search of material for his graduate studies, material, appeared on the antiquities market the young Cambridge graduate had been in the 1970s and all the fragments were also Return to Keros intrigued by rumours of a recent looting of broken, the mystery deepened. Was the site It was another two decades before Professor the almost uninhabited island relayed to him on Keros an ancient burial ground that, Renfrew was able to return, this time for by a Greek archaeologist. perhaps in haste, had been destroyed by three seasons of excavation, ending in 2008, Sure enough, evidence of looting looters, or was the site something else and with an international team of almost 30 abounded. As he reported back to the Greek entirely? experts. The post-excavation analyses of the Archaeological Service, on whose permit he finds are now nearing conclusion. had been surveying the Greek Cycladic A special deposit In the first year, the Cambridge –Keros islands, smashed marble statues and bowls A new opportunity to investigate came in Project team excavated at the southern site and broken pottery lay scattered over the 1987, when Renfrew, by then a Professor in and confirmed the presence of another hillside. the Department of Archaeology, and two Special Deposit, but this time undisturbed Despite the destruction, it was clear that Greek archaeologists were permitted to by looters. Many of the materials were the fragments were Early Cycladic, an excavate and survey the looted area, which bundled together in small pits up to two interesting find in itself. In fact, as he was to they called Special Deposit North. “We metres in diameter. The breakages were old discover, he had also stumbled upon the first recovered great quantities of broken and deliberate. Moreover, the absence of evidence of an astonishing Bronze Age ritual. material and yet as we excavated more we marble chips, expected in the case of found no indications of tombs,” said breakages on the spot, showed the Broken bodies Professor Renfrew. fragments had been broken elsewhere. As A year later, the Greek Archaeological Not only were the fragments not grave later radiocarbon dating confirmed, they Service carried out a major recovery, finding goods but the first of several astonishing had been deposited over a 500-year period fragments of a type of sculpture found features came to light, as Professor Renfrew from 2800 BC to 2300 BC. previously mainly in Cycladic Bronze Age explained: “As I studied the marble materials “But the strangest finding of all was that graves. The simplicity of these eerily for publication, I realised that nearly all of hardly any of the fragments of the 500-odd beautiful figurines, with their folded arms, the breakages seemed to be ancient and not figurines and 2,500 marble vessels joined sloping feet and featureless faces, are said to the result of the looting. They had been together,” said Professor Renfrew. “This was a have inspired Pablo Picasso and Henry deliberately broken before burial.” very interesting discovery. The only Moore. “Although this excavation didn’t resolve conclusion we could come to was that these On Keros, however, apart from a single the puzzle, it did emphasise how rich the site special materials were broken on other intact figurine, all others were broken. There was and how puzzling.” The archaeologists islands and single pieces of each figurine, were ‘body parts’ in their hundreds – an felt sure that more light would be shed by bowl or pot were brought by generations of elongated foot, a single breast, a folded arm, the investigation both of an area a few Cycladic islanders to Keros.” Features | 27

Bronze Age guesthouse? Sanctuary Meanwhile, across the short stretch of water As the team members conclude their to Dhaskalio, a very different picture was analyses of the finds, all indications point emerging. From the outset, the islet showed towards Keros having been a major ritual evidence of having been a major Bronze Age centre of the Cycladic civilisation. “We believe stronghold with structures built on carefully that the breaking of the statues and other prepared terraces circling a summit, on which goods was a ritual and that Keros was chosen a large hall was erected. The settlement dates as a sanctuary to preserve the effects,” said from around the time of the Special Deposits, Professor Renfrew. and then continued to operate before being He speculates that the objects were used abandoned around 2200 BC. repeatedly in rituals in the home islands, Examination of its geology showed that perhaps carried in ritual processions in much the beautifully regular walling of the the same way that icons are paraded today in settlement was imported marble rather than Greek villages: “They had a use-life, probably the flaky local limestone found on Keros. being painted and repainted from year to Remarkably, in the same era that the year. Perhaps the convention was that when pyramids were being built and Stonehenge a figure had reached the end of its use-life, it was being erected, Cycladic islanders were could not simply be thrown away or used shipping large quantities of building conventionally, it needed to be desanctified materials, probably by raft, over considerable in an elaborate process.” distances to build Dhaskalio. “Strangely,” he added, “there seems to Here, too, there were puzzling finds: a have been some obligation to bring a piece stash of about 500 egg-shaped pebbles at of the broken figure and deposit it on what the summit and stone discs found must have been the sacred island of Keros, everywhere across the settlement. And, possibly staying a few days on Dhaskalio although there was evidence that the olive while the ceremony was completed.” The and vine were well known to the inhabitants missing pieces of the statues, bowls and of Dhaskalio, the terrain there and on Keros pottery have never been located on other could never have supported the large islands, and Professor Renfrew wonders if population the scale of the site implies, they were thrown into the sea during transit suggesting that food also was imported. and have long since disintegrated. One answer is to hypothesise a largely This wouldn’t be the first time a transient population. Several strands make sanctuary has been identified in the Greek Fragments of figurines found on Keros; almost this plausible, as Dr Michael Boyd, who is islands – Delphi, Olympia and Delos, for 800 have been discovered to date collating the results of the post-excavation instance – but it would be the earliest by analyses, explained: “Archaeobotanical about 2,000 years and certainly the most “The breakages were old and evidence implies that the site was not mysterious. deliberate.” intensively occupied year-round, and the imported pottery and materials suggest The Cambridge–Keros project was authorised the possibility of groups coming seasonally by the Greek Archaeological Service and from elsewhere.” supported by the British School at Athens, “A possible attractor to the site,” he with funding from the Institute for Aegean added, “would of course be the Special Prehistory, McDonald Institute for Deposit on the immediately opposite shore.” Archaeological Research, Society of Antiquaries In fact, team geologists believe that of London, Stavros Niarchos Foundation, Dhaskalio and Keros were probably one land British Academy, Leventis Foundation and mass during the Early Bronze Age and that Leverhulme Trust. excavation on Dhaskalio, 80 metres off Keros (in the foreground), has revealed a major tectonic movement and rising sea levels Bronze Age stronghold created the divide. t h e c a M b r i d g e – k e r o s p r o J e c t

Professor colin Renfrew For more information, please contact Professor Colin Renfrew and Dr Michael Boyd ([email protected]) at the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research or visit www.arch.cam.ac.uk/keros/ 28 | Features © n i c k i e

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FluPhone: disease tracking by app

nfluenza is sweeping the UK, schools are greater than the cost incurred through actual A mobile phone app developed by closing, workplaces are short staffed, and illness.” Cambridge researchers that tracks Ithe race for a vaccine has begun – all the Understanding how people change their how people behave during an elements of a scenario that is not so very activities during an epidemic might not only hard to imagine. epidemic could be used to limit help authorities to devise strategies to reduce Localised epidemics and global the scale or length of the crisis but also help disease spread. pandemics periodically pose a significant them to tailor healthcare messages national and global threat. When this effectively. happens, it becomes vital for public health and Meet, connect, communicate government authorities to The FluPhone study at the Computer track how far and how fast Laboratory, led by co-principal investigators the disease is spreading. d Professor Crowcroft and Dr Eiko Yoneki, has

r

e But, to minimise the i k developed a new tool to study behaviour and

o

y health, social and o its consequences using mobile phones.

n e economic impact as far as k Dr Yoneki explained: “The application in the i possible, it’s also mobile phone monitors influenza-like important to know how symptoms by prompting questions for the people are likely to mobile phone owner. It also captures physical change their behaviour proximity information between individuals during the course of an by recording other devices nearby via epidemic. Bluetooth communication.” “How people In a pilot study, volunteers (mainly behave could limit or University of Cambridge employees and exacerbate their risk students) downloaded a Java-based of infection,” application to their mobile phones using an explained Professor intuitive interface. Ethical issues were Jon Crowcroft. handled carefully during participant “Patterns of social registration to the FluPhone study, and the interaction that study did not record the location information worsen the using GPS because of ethical considerations. spread of disease “A post-facto analysis of these data will pose a yield valuable insight into how human significant risk. communities are formed, how much time On the other people spend together, and how frequently hand, if people they meet. Such data show complex stay at home network-like structures, which is very useful rather than for understanding the spread of diseases,” work, the said Dr Yoneki. Symptom reporting screen in the cost to the Data collected over a few months – FluPhone application economy may be ironically coinciding with an outbreak of Features | 29

mhealth The use of mobile communication devices to gather data on how pandemics spread is one of the many innovative applications examined in a wide-ranging study of mobile communications for healthcare (so called mhealth) recently completed by the University.

The report – which is available for download at http://bit.ly/enEwq3 – describes the mHealth applications that have the potential to transform healthcare worldwide, from remote diagnostics and management of long-term conditions to clinical information systems, targeted public health messaging and supply chain management. The report uses primary research in China to illustrate the applications being developed by the world’s largest mobile telecoms operator, China Mobile (who sponsored the project), together with an extensive literature review of applications in the rest of the world. It also examines the benefits, costs and business cases for deploying mHealth services in developing and developed economies, and outlines the business strategies for telecoms operators. “In the next phase of deployment, generic service platforms are going to play a Data collected over a few months – crucial role,” commented Professor Ian Leslie, lead author of the report. “Until ironically coinciding with an recently, advanced applications required dedicated servers, but the emergence of outbreak of swine flu – cloud computing is obviating this need, and the upfront investment required to demonstrated the enormous deploy new applications is coming down. The actors best placed to drive a move potential of mobile phones as toward publicly available platforms are the large network operators.” scientific instruments with which For more information, please contact project manager Dr Nick Gray to measure the social activity of a ([email protected]). population in real time.

swine flu – demonstrated the enormous communication protocol via a mobile phone they are also considering ways that could be potential of mobile phones as scientific app, particularly in the event of a major used to counteract unhealthy or risky instruments with which to measure the social disease outbreak. behaviours, or those that threaten economic activity of a population in real time. “There stability. are more cell phones than people,” said Spreading information The researchers see potential use for Professor Crowcroft, “and, in most urban FluPhone is part of a wider project involving the approach in targeting and measuring areas, network coverage is close to 100%, seven academic institutions and government the effectiveness of public health messages – hence we can get very accurate agencies led by the University of Liverpool something that is traditionally very difficult measurement and sampling of the and funded by the Economic and Social to do because of the time it takes to gather population.” Sciences Research Council. The Cambridge data using traditional methods that involve In fact, the study highlighted how mobile team is planning a larger project using the surveys through primary care providers. phones can provide data that would be FluPhone technology together with one of Tellingly, their findings indicate that people otherwise unavailable, as Professor Crowcroft the project partners, the London School of are more likely to intend to heed health explained: “In this particular outbreak, it’s Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, to work in advice if it is underpinned with an now known that some people carried the several African countries at village population understanding of why people may not be disease yet were asymptomatic. Our system is level in Malawi, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, able to conduct a recommended behaviour, capable of identifying these asymptomatic Gambia, Ethiopia and Ghana. such as carrying on working during a ‘superspreaders’ because they show up by Dr Yoneki also leads a new five-year pandemic. virtue of the contacts who develop the project funded by the Engineering and disease.” Physical Sciences Research Council to extend To develop the model further, a virtual- and develop the analysis and modelling disease epidemic application has been approaches used in FluPhone. “Specific prototyped. Dr Yoneki explained: “A specific individuals can be identified who act as disease infection model can be programmed, coalescing hubs at different points in space and the fake ‘pathogens’ can be transmitted and time and who influence data flow. I want via Bluetooth radio communication when to investigate these spatial and social clusters two individuals are in proximity range.” to determine what impact they have on the “This has proved to be a fantastic tool – spread of viruses.” you can run a ‘what if’ experiment on the live Together, the multi-institution network of population based on their contacts, simply by epidemiologists, psychologists, economists randomly choosing some of the mobile and computer scientists is developing new Professor Jon Crowcroft and phones to be infectious,” said Professor ideas about the different ways individuals Dr Eiko Yoneki Crowcroft. “We can then model the effect of and organisations might respond to an For more information, please contact behaviour on disease spread.” outbreak of infectious disease. Professor Jon Crowcroft Given that technology such as this raises These include how people might ([email protected]) and ethical issues concerned with privacy, and behave when they or their dependants Dr Eiko Yoneki approval from the relevant ethics committees become ill, why they might avoid populated ([email protected]) at the was required before the project commenced, areas or workplaces for fear of infection, how Computer Laboratory or visit the team are now developing a series of they might respond if their workplace or www.cl.cam.ac.uk/research/srg/netos/ guidelines. They hope that these guidelines school was closed, and what might be driving fluphone/ will smooth future deployment of a their attitude to risk and infection. Crucially, 30 | Features M a t i a s

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The ‘voices’ of the artistic elite of Stalin’s Soviet Union, among them Dmitri Shostakovich, are being heard afresh in the first comprehensive study of a unique collection of transcripts. Musical notes from

Stalin’s Russian State Archive of Literature and Art in Moscow, where the Stalin Prize prize-givers committee transcripts are held

he year is 1940 and a team of a two-week period. Meanwhile, a separate Dr Frolova- stenographers are recording every committee would do the same for advances Walker hopes to Tword spoken by an illustrious in science, technology and medicine. discover lost gathering of the Soviet Union’s most Their remit was to decide whose pieces of Soviet influential musicians, composers, artists, achievements should be honoured through music that did actors and writers. The event is the annual the Stalin Prize – an honour so great in terms not win the gathering of Joseph Stalin’s Prize Committee of recognition and remuneration that when recognition they i L i for the arts. As the stenographers preserve Geidar Guseinov was awarded the prize only might have c h verbatim the conversations around them, to have it retracted he tragically committed deserved, as a they unknowingly create what will become a suicide. consequence gem of musical history. “What the transcripts offer is access to of Stalin’s Stalin’s Soviet Union was a time not only how the elite circle made their crucial tendency to of political persecution and repression but decisions and how they balanced merit with overrule. also of artistic censorship. The favoured style the ideological constraints of socialist “This is a was ‘socialist realism’, which championed the realism,” explained Dr Frolova-Walker. “The dream heroes and ideals of the socialist regime, and Committee would make their opportunity renounced the more experimental modern recommendations but the list would be at for me, allowing styles such as surrealism, futurism and the mercy of Stalin’s prerogative to overrule. me to combine my cubism. It will be fascinating to compare the final experience as a musicologist with the skills I This black-and-white portrayal is how recommendations with what happened have amassed in my work with historical many have come to regard the Stalinist after the list reached Stalin.” documents from the Soviet period.” regime, but how far did the artists, “Because the meetings lay in a grey area Her detective work in putting together a musicians, writers and composers of the between private and public discourse,” she coherent picture from the documentary raw time accept Stalin’s dictates? The transcripts added, “the members felt safe despite the material will provide the first true insider’s of the Stalin Prize Committee – which have regime, possibly because they were perspective on the workings of the Soviet astonishingly lain unexamined on the protected by their professions and their musical world. shelves of Moscow archives for over half a institutions. As a result, they are remarkably century – offer the first chance to look at the candid and at times outspoken.” situation as it really was. “It feels like time travel,” said Dr Marina new perspectives Frolova-Walker from the Faculty of Music, As she works her way through the archive, she who has begun a two-year study of the is coming across instances that breathe new archive funded by the Leverhulme Trust. life into contemporary understanding of the “When I began to read the transcripts, their Soviet musical world. “At one point a debate voices lifted off the page. It was as if I was rages as to whether composer Dmitri sitting in their meetings listening to the Shostakovich should receive a Prize, given that debates as they happened.” his music challenged even the Committee members in how far it broke the mould. One Eyes on the Stalin Prize member describes the atmosphere as being Dr Marina Frolova-Walker The dozens of volumes of transcripts cover as intense as a nuclear laboratory.” For more information, please contact the annual meetings held between 1940 and Shostakovich was himself a Committee Dr Marina Frolova-Walker 1954, when up to 50 of the main players in member and, in the transcripts, ceaselessly ([email protected]) at the Faculty of the cultural world of Stalin’s Soviet Union champions the work of his students, talented Music (www.mus.cam.ac.uk/). would meet to discuss the nominations over people who tended not to conform. Inside out | 31 b o

t out of the window in the back of the ambulance h

i M to want to get out there to work. a g e s :

a

x Have you ever had a Eureka moment? e L

s

t Realising, as a graduate student, that there is no e u

w definitive text of any single saga was a very e r exciting moment. The sagas were copied continuously in Iceland from the medieval period right up until the 19th century, and even into the early 20th century. They are anonymously authored and each time someone copied a saga from one manuscript they were free to alter the text however they liked, to improve the style or content, for example. The manuscripts bear witness to centuries of human engagement with, and enjoyment of, the sagas. Suddenly, the sagas became more to me than compelling stories printed between the covers of editions lined up on library shelves. The idea that the concept of an ‘original text’ is irrelevant as far as the sagas are concerned, and also that no single manuscript-text of a saga need be considered the ‘best’ text, was an extremely Dr emily Lethbridge liberating one that opened up all kinds of new possibilities for me as far as my research into the now mid-way through a year-long 21st-century pilgrimage to the sagas, and their transmission and reception, settings of Iceland’s famous medieval Íslendingasögur (‘sagas of was concerned. Icelanders’), Dr Emily Lethbridge has crisscrossed the country in her What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever ex-MOD Land Rover ambulance on the trail of outlaws, shapeshifters, been given? mound-dwelling viking-zombies, and ordinary men and women who My grandfather used to say ‘Let the saw do the lived in Iceland a thousand years ago. work’ when teaching me and my brother and sister wood-working as children; I can hear him intoning the phrase as though I’m listening to a Written in the 13th and 14th centuries, the What would others be surprised to learn recording. My carpentry skills never really Íslendingasögur are an extraordinary literary about you? evolved beyond making various crude genre that transmit stories about the I can milk a herd of 50 cows on my own and at constructions that parents seemed to value as individuals who lived, loved, fought and died times I am happiest with shovel in hand and a presents, but I have come to think that it’s not a in the 9th, 10th and 11th centuries after the good half-an-hour’s worth of early morning bad precept to try to live and work by – to utilise island had been settled by them. To this day, cow-pat clearing-up to get stuck into... I learnt the energy, ideas and resources one has already the sagas are a cornerstone of Icelandic how to speak modern Icelandic by spending the in order to try to move forward and make culture. summer of 2008 on a farm in the north of progress. Researcher Dr Emily Lethbridge’s quest to Iceland, during the first year of my Research travel around Iceland reading each of the 30 Fellowship at Emmanuel College. The family on If you could wake up tomorrow with a new sagas in the very landscapes, the ‘saga-steads’, the farm taught me modern phrases and skill, what would it be? in which they were set began in January pronunciation (my Old Icelandic vocabulary Waking up with a professional understanding of 2011. The decommissioned ‘Embulance’ is her prompted equal amounts of laughter and exactly what’s going on under the bonnet of my mobile home for the duration of the research bewilderment); the cows taught me to be more Land Rover (as well as the Icelandic words for project. patient. every part of the engine) would be very useful... One objective of her partly sponsored I am learning on the job, so to speak, and have and partly self-funded trip, which can be Who or what inspires you? various manuals to hand (this makes people I’ve followed at http://sagasteads.blogspot.com/, The magnificence and power of the Icelandic met here who know about cars laugh!). But it’s is to gather material on Icelandic culture for landscape, in all different weathers and at all another world in there and I wouldn’t say I’m a her research in the Department of Anglo- times of year. I consider myself exceptionally natural mechanic... Saxon, Norse and Celtic. lucky to have this opportunity to explore the “This kind of ‘literary fieldwork’ approach endlessly varying terrain across the country in What is your favourite research tool? is not only strengthening and making my such depth. Travelling and living in the This year: my two feet, walking boots and a understanding of the sagas more nuanced, ambulance in the winter months did present 31-part set of 1:100,000 maps of Iceland. both as narratives in themselves and as a certain physical challenges at times, but the medieval and modern cultural phenomenon, northern lights, the perfection of deep Watch out for the next Cambridge Ideas but also I hope that the book I’m writing unblemished snow on the mountains and in the film, featuring Emily’s 21st-century about the sagas and the ways in which they valleys, and the feeling of exhilaration when pilgrimage to the sites of the are inscribed in the spectacular Icelandic storms were raging outside but I was safe and Íslendingasögur. landscape will appeal to a general audience warm in the ambulance will be what I as well as a specialist one.” remember. Now it’s warmer, I only have to look 32 | The back page

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