While the dynamics of gases which occupy the majority of the universe are dominated by billiard ball-like collisions between particles, at temperatures which are less than a millionth of a degree above absolute zero quantum mechanics takes over. Here, a class of particles called bosons cease to behave like individual particles. Rather than bouncing off each other, the millions of bosons present enter the same quantum state, and behave as one, single, giant wave of matter. This quantum fluid has several remarkable properties, including its ability to flow without viscosity. Quantum fluids are an active area of research, with hundreds of state-of-the-art laboratories around the world creating and studying quantum fluids. The main advantage of quantum fluids is that, due to their high degree of experimental control (experimentalists are able to precisely tune the fluid's physical properties and manipulate it in time and space), they are a "clean" way to realise a many-particle quantum system, giving rich insight into the quantum world. Quantum fluids can also be used as a testbed for complicated physical phenomena such as superconductors, black holes, and the Big Bang. They also offer access to new physical regimes of fluid dynamics, the ability to study broader topics in turbulence, and the potential to solve challenges in imaging quantum fluid flows. Just like in classical fluid, it is possible to have turbulence in quantum fluids, although the physics behind this turbulence are subtly different. In classical fluids, a vortex can have an arbitrary size and strength - from the whirlpool created when you empty the bath, to the red spot of Jupiter. In quantum fluids, on the other hand, vortices have a fixed quanta of circulation and a fixed vortex core size, forming a point in 2D, or a vortex filament in 3D. These quantum vortices are the building blocks of turbulence in quantum fluids; in large systems which are driven out of equilibrium, turbulence manifests itself as many vortices arranged in a complex tangle. Unfortunately it is difficult to visualise the flow of quantum fluids, since line-of-sight imaging can't be used to image a complex distribution of tangled vortices in 3D. While in classical fluids small particles can be traced by ultra-fast cameras providing snapshots of the flow, these particles are much larger than the size of a quantum vortex. As a result, the particles alter the dynamics of the fluid, suppressing turbulence, and obscuring the flow that they are attempting to visualise. It is also possible to create a mixture of quantum fluids. This mixture may be miscible (where the two constituent fluids form a homogeneous mixture) or immiscible (where it is energetically unfavourable for the fluids to overlap), like oil and water. In the immiscible regime, if one of the fluids is heavily populated (the majority fluid) and the other is weakly populated (the minority fluid) , the minority fluid will in-fill the vortex cores of the majority fluid. This provides a potential route to tracing the vortices in the majority fluid, however changing properties of the minority fluid (such as adding more particles to this fluid) can modify the properties of the vortex, suggesting new regimes of vortex dynamics and turbulence. The aim of this fellowship is to explore the nature of immiscible quantum fluids across a range of length scales. I will build up from the microscopic scale of one or a few vortices (dynamics of vortex pairs and vortex nucleation in 2D, vortex reconnections and Kelvin wave cascades in 3D) to macroscopic systems of many vortices (Onsager vortex formation in 2D, quantum turbulence in 2D and 3D). The relevance of these results to current state-of-the-art experiments will be enhanced by collaborations with world leading experimentalists, while predictions on potential flow visualisation applications will inform future cold atom experiments.

Aculeate wasps are understudied relative to their more popular cousins, bees and wasps, and yet are more biodiverse than bees and wasps combined. This is particularly so for the solitary wasps, who represent over 90% of all aculeate wasp species and exhibit remarkable diversity in their ecology and life-history, especially in their hunting behaviours. Solitary wasps are also the ancestors of social wasps, bees and ants; despite the significant contributions over the last decade of sociogenomics to our understanding of social evolution in insects, we lack genomic resources for solitary wasps - the critical 'starting blocks' of social evolution. Solitary wasps also provide important, but largely overlooked, ecosystem services as top predators of arthropod populations making them key to maintaining equilibrium in biodiversity. Solitary wasps are also prey-specialists and so fill a different niche to the (generalist) social wasps: they provide untapped potential to study genomic sensory mechanisms in the evolution of hunting. The only non-social wasp genome available is for the parasitic jewel wasp, which is not an Aculeate (stinging wasp) and exhibits very specialised life history; we lack any genome sequences of solitary (non-parasitic) hunting wasps. The biodiversity of wasps in Brazil is unrivalled and although there is a strong legacy of wasp research in Brazil, genomic resources for Brazilian insects are largely lacking, and Brazilian entomologists have poor access to state-of-the-art genomic tools. This project will generate the essential fundamental genomic tools and training to kick-start new fields of study in the evolutionary and ecological importance of these biodiverse insects, seeding long-term collaborative projects between UK and Brazilian (BR) researchers. Our collaborative team will integrate state-of-the-art genomic and bioinformatic techniques (UK partner) with expertise in natural history and sensory ecology (BR partners) to exploit the unrivalled biodiversity of Brazilian solitary wasps and position BR scientists as pioneers in the untapped field of solitary wasp genomics. In doing so, we will generate the first genome sequences for solitary wasps. This proposal also takes the first steps in utilising these genomic resources to address an outstanding question in insect ecology: what is the genomic basis of predator-prey evolution? By integrating genomic expertise of the UK partner with the ecological and chemical expertise of the BR partners, this project will spawn a new area of research, led by international teams of BR & UK scientists. The UK partner will train Brazilians in the critical analytical tools required to determine the molecular basis of specialist hunting behaviours in solitary wasps, including genome annotations and comparative genomics methods. With high-quality, chromo-some-level genomes in hand, we will together conduct gene evolution analyses of genes associated with chemical perception - odorant binding receptors and olfactory receptors, and determine how genomic processes have been integrated in the evolution of prey specificity. Finally, in addition to generating these essential resources, and training Brazilian researchers into genomic methods, this project will provide a conceptual and empirical springboard of a long-term collaborations between BR & UK scientists, placing us as pioneers in the molecular studies of solitary neotropical wasps.

Plant invasions can have wide-ranging ecological impacts on native communities and ecosystems. In southern Brazil, tall, herbaceous invasive plants such as white ginger (Hedychium coronarium) and elephant grass (Cenchrus purpureus) could alter the distribution and abundance of capybara (Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris) within landscapes, by providing refuge and resting habitat, and potentially, food. Capybara carry the tick Amblyomma sculptum which is the disease-vector of the bacterium Rickettsia rickettsii; the agent of often-fatal Brazilian Spotted Fever (BSF) in people. Thus, there is potential for the invasive plants to increase disease risk in invaded areas, but the strength of the relationships between invasive plants, capybara and ticks remains unquantified. Understanding these dynamics and their generality will have significant consequences for understanding spatiotemporal patterns of tick-borne disease risk in this region. This project's overarching goal is to describe and understand the putative invasive plant-capybara-tick system in São Paulo state, which will form the basis of further investigation and forecasting of the human health risks posed by this system and its component species. Our project will be supported by three workshops: two at the University of São Paulo and a final project partner workshop at Durham University. At the start of the project, Workshop 1 will establish a network of researchers and protected area managers in the state focused on monitoring Hedychium, Cenchrus and their interactions with capybara and ticks. This network will form the basis of a data collection campaign to establish the distribution of the invasive plants and capybara. We will use these distribution data to select sites for tick abundance sampling and camera trap surveys, in paired invaded and uninvaded vegetation, to test if tick abundance and capybara occupancy are higher in invaded areas. Capybara and tick data will be collected in the second half of the project, after Workshop 2, when we will provide training in camera trap methods to estimate capybara occupancy, initiate a pilot study to confirm evidence of capybara presence from vegetation features in drone images, and finalise tick survey methods. After field data collection and analysis, we will review our key findings in Workshop 3 at the end of the project, discuss lessons learned and develop targeted grant applications to expand the project. Our project will bring together a unique combination of skills and experience of the project partners to form the basis of a long-lasting UK-São Paulo state collaborative network, focused on systems-based research of the impacts of invasive species.

Increasing concerns over the environmental impact of plastic single-use packaging have reached a critical juncture. Mumbai-one the largest cities in India-implemented a ban on single-use plastic bags, plastic cups and plastic bottles, with a stiff penalty (5000 rupees) or up to three months in jail for those vendors caught selling these products (Dhillon, 2018). From a corporate initiative, IKEA, has recently adopted biodegradable packaging made from mycelium (mushroom), which mimics the texture of polystyrene (Lempert, 2018). With growing awareness of the negative environmental impacts of petroleum-based packaging, the trend towards adopting bio-based products has increased. Currently, the highest demand for bio-based packaging is situated within the food industry. In a recent meeting of the World Economic Forum, it is claimed that biodegradable packaging is good for the economy and the environment. However, while bio-based packaging may be seen as a "disruptive innovation", there is a lack of studies exploring the social and environmental implications of this product. For example, bioplastic packaging is hard to distinguish from its plastic counterpart, resulting in contamination and waste management issues at a municipal level (UNEP, 2015). As such, the adoption of this product becomes a "wicked problem" as it is seemingly impossible to solve due to the numerous interdependent factors that simultaneously impact solutions. To address this issue, four research partners consisting of the UK, Canada, Brazil and Poland, will implement four collaborative social innovation labs. A social innovation methodology is critical to better understand how bio-based packaging innovation will impact the environment and diverse stakeholders across the supply chain, especially as it relates to food security, waste infrastructure, formal and informal waste collectors, consumers, vendors, food producers, and policymakers.

Safeguarding insect biodiversity has a global impact. Insects increase crop yields, help food production and economies, and are essential for ecosystem functioning. Scientific research and expertise must, therefore, ensure we not only understand what is causing global insect biodiversity changes but also enable us to mitigate the further consequences for nature and people. Tropical forests are an ideal setting to investigate the occurrence, drivers and consequences of insect biodiversity loss because they are home to much of Earth's terrestrial biodiversity - including the majority of all known species, and provide many ecosystem services upon which humanity relies. Despite the growing number of academic studies and media headlines drawing attention to 'collapses in insect biodiversity', the status of insect populations continues to attract insufficient research attention. This bias is evidenced by the fact that only c. 1% of all described insects have had their conservation status assessed by the IUCN compared with 72% of vertebrates. Our ability to inform better environmental decision-making and conservation policy-making is further limited by other three factors. First, the tropics have been mostly overlooked in previous large-scale and long-term assessments of insect biodiversity trends. Second, little is known about how the use of agricultural pesticides affects tropical insect populations in nearby forests. Finally, our knowledge of insect interaction networks within tropical forests is limited to a few assessments based on single locations or model taxa. As a result, we continue to miss a broader picture of the nature and scale of changes in tropical insects' diversity and populations, the factors driving these changes, and the further consequences for forest function and stability. To redress these gaps in our understanding, my research aims to: 1) investigate the occurrence, scale and causes of changes in tropical insect biodiversity; 2) quantify the impacts of agricultural pesticides and heavy metals on insect populations; 3) determine the cascade effects of insect loss for their interactions with other biological groups; and 4) promote biodiversity conservation through forecasting how distinct scenarios of climate change and land-use intensification will affect tropical insects to inform the decision-making. To achieve this, I will establish the first pantropical insect monitoring programme with standardized methods in Amazonian, African and Asian forests. This information will be combined with state-of-the-art ecotoxicology, metabarcoding, remote sensing and ecological modelling techniques to assess disturbance-driven impacts on insect communities and populations, changes in interaction networks with other taxonomic groups, and the contamination by distinct pollutants. Moreover, I will integrate information generated through the fellowship with large-scale spatialized insect abundance data from the study regions to forecast the impacts of further climate and land-use changes on insect biodiversity. To achieve impact and inform practices and policies, I will engage with distinct stakeholders in the study regions. To the best of my knowledge, this will be the first pantropical study aiming to investigate spatiotemporal changes in multiple insect groups surveyed with standardized methods in tropical forests. In doing so, my research will help us to understand the causes and mitigate the consequences of changes in tropical insect biodiversity; and generate data that will inform policy-making and biodiversity conservation strategies in the hyperdiverse tropics.