A multifunctional web portal which holds all the training materials and also promotes the STARS PhD students and their projects to the wider world. We want to maximise the exposure of our student’s research.

This will provide a lively feed from the STARS cohort around the UK. It will showcase achievements and provide the latest news from the STARS programme. To start, follow @STARScdt and #starsoil for more updates on Twitter…

To commence the STARS experience we hold a welcome meeting early in the first term. This is a 3 day-long meeting where all the PhD students,  supervisors and STARS staff meet to get to know each other and to discuss how to maximise the PhD experience. It is a relaxed, enjoyable & informal event with plenty […]

29th April – 3rd May 2019 Aimed at PhD students needing a grounding in soil science, this course is now in its 4th year. Previously only available to students within the STARS Centre for Doctoral Training, it is now available to all PhD students. The course starts at Lancaster University, with an introduction to research […]

This 5-day course will be hosted by Cranfield University and British Geological Survey. The course will cover the following topics: An introduction to soil science statistics Design-based sampling, estimation and sample planning An introduction to linear models Model-based sampling, geostatistics and other methods for spatial data Principles and pitfalls in experimental design An introduction to […]

This 3-day workshop will be hosted by the Univ of Nottingham and will build on the team Introduction and Start-up Meeting. Students will work in a collaborative workshop environment, facilitated by their supervisors, to refine their research proposal plan and determine the aims, objectives and hypothesis to be tested. The workshop will guide students on […]

STARS students will participate in the British Soil Science Society conference for Early Career Soil Scientists. This provides students with an opportunity to present their research in a friendly environment to an audience made up mostly of their peers. Students in Year 1 will give a poster presentation and those in Years 2 and 3 […]

Students will present at the British Society of Soil Science Annual Meeting alongside a 1-day STARS Workshop. All students will produce posters for the BSSS meeting. At the end of both conference days the students will have a 1.5 hour evening session to discuss the highlights of the day. The last day will be a […]

Part of the STARS training will be the ability to critically review scientific papers. Students will participate in a monthly journal club whereby one student each month selects a topical paper, which the STARS team will critically debate via Google Hangouts. This will follow the model of theEvolutionary Biology Online Journal Club and will be […]

In Year 2 we will spend a week on the islands of Tenerife and La Gomera getting hands-on with 8 of the Great Soil Orders of the world. This will look at soils we wouldn’t normally see in the UK and includes Vertisols, Andisols, Oxisols, Aridosols and Ultisols (typical of tropical and arid climates). The […]