Environmental Biology, BSc (Hons)

This course is designed for those passionate about environmental protection, wildlife conservation, and ecology. It explores human impacts on the natural environment, focusing on threats such as climate change, habitat loss, and invasive species. Students will study these issues, learn management strategies, and develop practical skills through fieldwork, including surveying techniques like bat surveys and habitat assessments. Topics covered include ecology, conservation, animal behaviour, botany, sustainability, and environmental protection.Core modules in the first year introduce principles of ecology, biodiversity, evolution, and behaviour through lectures, labs, and field visits. Later years offer optional modules on plant evolution, conservation, and evolutionary ecology, culminating in a research project. Opportunities for industry placements and studying abroad provide real-world experience and a global perspective on environmental science.

Core modules in your first year introduce the principles of ecology and biodiversity. You'll learn about evolution and behaviour. Study how natural selection has shaped how organisms interact with their environment. Learn through lectures, lab sessions and field visits. In year two you'll gain more practical fieldwork skills as part of a non-residential field course. The Ecology module teaches you how interactions between species can drive co-evolutionary processes. In the second year and third years, you have lots of optional modules. You can choose to study plant evolution and ecology in The Green Planet module.  In your final year, the research project enables you to use your skills to work on a piece of original research. This can be lab, field or literature based. You will design the study, collect and analyse data. Optional modules include Conservation, Evolutionary Ecology and the Arctic Ecology Field Course.