Our research is primarily concerned with the geology and evolution of sedimentary basins. Although our research seeks answers to fundamental questions from the Earth System, we do this in collaboration with the energy industry. These partnerships provide access to valuable subsurface datasets (especially 2D and 3D seismic), together with the tools and methods of the oil and gas sector.  These opportunities allow us to address the following issues:

Sediment flux, climate change and tectonics
Sedimentary systems at continental margins
Monsoons, erosion, tectonics and climate in SE Asia
Geomorphology and sediment routing in rifts
Rock record of ancestral river systems
Triassic palaeoenvironments
Depositional systems of dryland rivers
Uncertainty in climate models.

Tectonics
Continental geodynamics and pan-Tethyan basin evolution
Geodynamic evolution of SE Asia
Depth-variable deformation styles in the continents.

Structural geology
Localization of deformation in sedimentary basins
Predicting fracture patterns and structural damage
Fault system evolution
Salt tectonics
Soft sediment deformation, remobilization
Interpreting structures in geophysical datasets.

Mobile substrates and sedimentation
Salt and shale systems
Submarine mass transport complexes.

Deepwater frontiers
Submarine slope architecture
Depositional systems and hydrocarbon reservoirs
Remobilisation of submarine sands, shear and injection.
Atlantic volcanic margin stratigraphy, processes and imaging.

Geofluids and porous media
Hydrocarbon generation and migration
Enhancing extraction of heavy oil
Carbonate and siliciclastic reservoirs.

Meteorite impacts, astrobiology and early biota
Preservation of organics in meteorites and impacts
Biomass recovery after impact events
Chemical signatures of early life

We do not operate formal research groups although teams of researchers working on specific topics are organised into working groups. Our vibrant community of postdoctoral researchers and research students move easily between the various research themes.

Illustrations (from top): Eastern Himalayas, Ganges and the Bay of Bengal from space; modelling basin formation in central Europe; faults in poorly consolidated sandstones, New Zealand; seismic of folded Messinian evaporates and younger strata, Ionian Sea; bathymetry of part of the Nile fan from 3D seismic; complex cement histories and pore fills; imaging methane in the Martian atmosphere.