Contact Dr Jacqueline Hannam
- Tel: +44 (0) 1234 754586
- Email: j.a.hannam@cranfield.ac.uk
- Twitter: @Dirt_Science
- ORCID
- Google Scholar
Areas of expertise
- Digital Agriculture
- Monitoring and Environmental Informatics
- Natural Capital
- Soil
- Soil Resources
- Sustainable Land Systems
Background
Jack currently leads the Soil Informatics group and the LandIS team at Cranfield University, who are responsible for the national soil data for England and Wales (http://www.landis.org.uk). She is President of the British Society of Soil Science (BSSS) https://soils.org.uk/.
Jack’s research on land use decisions is focused on soil data, soil health and soil policy. Her work in soil data and modelling fuses novel machine learning approaches with expert and local knowledge to develop new predictions of soil properties at national scales. She is interested in how different forms of soil data (e.g. spectroscopy or citizen-sourced data) can be used to inform local sustainable soil management and also feed into national monitoring schemes. Work on predictive mapping of land capability (http://lle.gov.wales/map/alc2) identified how climate change could affect the national capability of land for agriculture. The outputs have been used for decision making by the Welsh Government and Defra in national and local policies. Her work on soil health has developed proof-of-concept soil health indicators for government and land owners. She works closely with farmers and growers to implement regenerative agriculture for better soil health outcomes. Her policy-relevant research sees her working collaboratively with policymakers, bringing evidence directly into land use and soil policy design and implementation. She completed an 24 month secondment (2021-2023) in Welsh Government Soil Policy Team developing a new soil policy for Wales.
She is Associate Editor for the journals Soil Use and Management and SOIL. She is on the scientific committee for the Land Use, Land Use Change to Forestry sector for the UK GHG emission inventory. She is a passionate science communicator and has been interviewed on BBC Countryfile, BBC Radio 4 Today programme, Sky News and BBC World. She founded Soapbox Science in Milton Keynes in 2015, a public outreach platform promoting women in science. She is a member of Cranfield University's Community and Public Engagement working group and the School of Water Energy and Environment Diversity and Inclusion group.
She leads the soil systems module on the Agrifood MSc programme and has successfully supervised and examined numerous PhD and MSc students. She has developed and delivered advanced NERC training courses in soil systems for early career researchers and bespoke short courses for environmental science professionals.
Research opportunities
I am interested in supervising PhD students in the following areas: land use decisions for net zero; soil data, modelling and mapping; soil health; soil policy; regenerative agriculture; urban soil systems; transdisciplinary soil science (social science/art interface)
Current activities
Soil data and land use decision modelling
Developing Bayesian approaches for soil property estimation at national scales (LandIS).
EU project to develop regional-scale harmonised soil data for the Danube Basin (Joint Research Centre with ISRIC).
Updated map of peat soils in Wales providing new estimates of soil carbon stock and GHG emissions (Welsh Government). Wales Peatland Data Portal: https://smnr-nrw.hub.arcgis.com/apps/d18ef8c74ecc4dc4a0cbf71ab6935ba0/explore
Land capability approaches applied in an ESRC project to determine how soil functions are impacted by land use change resulting from food and nutrition scenarios emerging from the UK response to COVID-19 and Brexit (ES/V004433/1).
Soil health and regenerative agriculture
Developing indicators for soil health in England (JNCC/Defra) https://jncc.gov.uk/news/soil-health-indicator-report-published/
David Clarke (PhD researcher NERC Centa2 DTP) is exploring how to use on-farm data to identify site-season interactions in soil and crop for sustainable intensification (with NIAB and BGS).
George Sawyer (PhD researcher University of Reading BBSRC FoodBioSystems DTP) is investigating how cover crops can increase the resilience of the agri-food system.
Zhaoxing Li (PhD researcher NERC Centa2 DTP) is assessing the soil mesofaunal response to climate pressures and the resulting impacts on soil function.
Harriet Gold (PhD researcher BBSRC FoodBioSystems DTP) is designing UK agricultural landscapes by developing a mechanistic landscape-scale model for several terrestrial invertebrates to predict agroecosystem resilience (with University of Reading and Syngenta)
Soil Policy
I co-produced a new Soil Policy Statement for Wales during 24 month secondment (2021-2023) in the Welsh Government Soil Policy Team supported by a team of PhD Policy Placements (Carmen Sanchez Garcia, Erik Button, Beth Roberts, Danielle Hunt, Nicola Wynn). I am continuing to work with the team to finalize the Soil Policy statement and associated work.
I have co-authored an extensive synthesis of evidence (and digestible executive summary of the main findings) that forms the basis of the draft soil policy statement https://www.gov.wales/review-welsh-soil-evidence
Our researcher experiences developing soil policy that works in practice was based on effective partnerships and co-production between policy makers, researchers and key stakeholders. We presented our novel approaches at the first Soil Policy day at the World Congress of Soil Science in 2022. Our current summary of the process is published in the Soil Policy Legacy Report by The British Society of Soil Science https://soils.org.uk/education/guidance-and-science-notes/
Art/Science interface
Jack contributed to a NERC Creative Climate Connections project 'Sensing Soil' working with Dr Ros Gray and artist Harun Morrison in the Goldsmiths Art and Research Garden and participants from Lewisham Refugee and Migrant Network on the climate and cultural connections of soil in urban environments.
She also hosts artists (https://www.sarah-strachan.co.uk/) at the National Soil Archive at Cranfield University who are using the resources as research in art practice.
Previous PhD researchers
Tom Storr
Grant Campbell
Timo Breure
Clients
NERCESRC
Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission
Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra)
Welsh Government
Gs Growers
Dstl
Cobham Antenna Systems
Publications
Articles In Journals
- Girkin NT, Burgess PJ, Cole L, Cooper HV, Coronado EH, Davidson SJ, Hannam J, Harris J, Holman I, McCloskey CS, McKeown MM, Milner AM, Page S, Smith J & Young D (2023) The three-peat challenge: business as usual, responsible agriculture, and conservation and restoration as management trajectories in global peatlands, Carbon Management, 14 (1) Article No. 2275578.
- Sánchez-García C, Button ES, Wynne-Jones S, Porter H, Rugg I & Hannam JA (2023) Finding common ground: co-producing national soil policy in Wales through academic and government collaboration, Soil Security, 11 (June) Article No. 100095.
- Sakrabani R, Garnett K, Knox JW, Rickson J, Pawlett M, Falagan N, Girkin NT, Cain M, Alamar MC, Burgess PJ, Harris J, Patchigolla K, Sandars D, Graves A, Hannam J & Simmons RW (2023) Towards net zero in agriculture: future challenges and opportunities for arable, livestock and protected cropping systems in the UK, Outlook On Agriculture, 52 (2) 116-125.
- Borchers N, Hannam J & Pawlett M (2022) Microbial community composition of translocated ancient woodland soil: a case study, Restoration Ecology, 30 (7) Article No. e13618. Dataset/s: 10.17862/cranfield.rd.14882727
- Breure TS, Haefele SM, Hannam JA, Corstanje R, Webster R, Moreno-Rojas S & Milne AE (2022) A loss function to evaluate agricultural decision-making under uncertainty: a case study of soil spectroscopy, Precision Agriculture, 23 (4) 1333-1353.
- Brevik EC, Krzic M, Muggler C, Field D, Hannam J & Uchida Y (2022) Soil science education – a multi-national look at current perspectives, Natural Sciences Education, 51 (1) Article No. e20077.
- Chen S, Arrouays D, Mulder VL, Poggio L, Minasny B, Roudier P, Libohova Z, Lagacherie P, Shi Z, Hannam J, Meersmans J, Richer-de-Forges AC & Walter C (2022) Digital mapping of GlobalSoilMap soil properties at a broad scale: a review, Geoderma, 409 (March) Article No. 115567.
- Brevik EC, Hannam J, Krzic M, Muggler C & Uchida Y (2022) The importance of soil education to connectivity as a dimension of soil security, Soil Security, 7 (June) Article No. 100066.
- Breure TS, Prout JM, Haefele SM, Milne AE, Hannam JA, Moreno-Rojas S & Corstanje R (2022) Comparing the effect of different sample conditions and spectral libraries on the prediction accuracy of soil properties from near- and mid-infrared spectra at the field-scale, Soil and Tillage Research, 215 (January) Article No. 105196. Dataset/s: 10.17862/cranfield.rd.16732891, 10.17862/cranfield.rd.16719823
- Rivington M, King R, Duckett D, Iannetta P, Benton TG, Burgess PJ, Hawes C, Wellesley L, Polhill JG, Aitkenhead M, Lozada‐Ellison LM, Begg G, Williams AG, Newton A, Lorenzo‐Arribas A, Neilson R, Watts C, Harris J, Loades K, Stewart D, Wardell‐Johnson D, Gandossi G, Udugbezi E, Hannam JA & Keay C (2021) UK food and nutrition security during and after the COVID-19 pandemic, Nutrition Bulletin, 46 (1) 88-97.
- Pawlett M, Hannam JA & Knox JW (2021) Redefining soil health, Microbiology, 167 (1) Article No. 001030.
- Storr T, Simmons RW & Hannam JA (2021) Using frost sensitive cover crops for timely nitrogen mineralization and soil moisture management, Soil Use and Management, 37 (3) 427-435. Dataset/s: 10.17862/cranfield.rd.7660817
- Breure TS, Milne AE, Webster R, Haefele SM, Hannam JA, Moreno-Rojas S & Corstanje R (2021) Predicting the growth of lettuce from soil infrared reflectance spectra: the potential for crop management, Precision Agriculture, 22 (1) 226-248.
- Gabarron-Galeote MA, Hannam JA, Mayr T & Jarvis PJ (2019) BEETSOIL: a decision support tool for forecasting the impact of soil conditions on sugar beet harvest, Soil and Tillage Research, 191 (August) 131-141. Dataset/s: 10.17862/cranfield.rd.8025401
- Storr T, Simmons RW & Hannam JA (2019) A UK survey of the use and management of cover crops, Annals of Applied Biology, 174 (2) 179-189. Dataset/s: 10.17862/cranfield.rd.7314278
- Hallett SH, Sakrabani R, Keay CA & Hannam JA (2017) Developments in land information systems: examples demonstrating land resource management capabilities and options, Soil Use and Management, 33 (4) 514-529.
- Hannam J (2017) S.O.S. - Save our soil today to meet the food challenges of tomorrow, Environmental Scientist, 26 (1) 25-31.
- Preetz H, Igel J, Hannam JA & Stadler S (2017) Relationship between magnetic properties and reddening of tropical soils as indicators of weathering, Geoderma, 303 (October) 143-149.
- Taalab K, Corstanje R, Zawadzka J, Mayr T, Whelan MJ, Hannam JA & Creamer R (2015) On the application of Bayesian Networks in Digital Soil Mapping, Geoderma, 259-260 (December) 134-148.
- Simo I, Schulte RPO, Corstanje R, Hannam J & and Creamer RE (2015) Validating digital soil maps using soil taxonomic distance: A case study of Ireland., Geoderma Regional, 5 188-197.
- Keay CA, Jones RJA, Hannam J & Barrie I (2014) The implications of a changing climate on agricultural land classification in England and Wales, Journal of Agricultural Science, 152 (1) 23-37.
- Cavazzi S, Corstanje R, Mayr T, Hannam J & Fealy R (2013) Are fine resolution digital elevation models always the best choice in digital soil mapping?, Geoderma, 195-196 111-121.
- Hollis JM, Hannam J & Bellamy PH (2011) Empirically-derived pedotransfer functions for predicting bulk density in European soils, European Journal of Soil Science, 63 (1) 96-109.
- Boyle JF, Dearing JA, Blundell A & Hannam JA (2010) Testing competing hypotheses for soil magnetic susceptibility using a new chemical kinetic model, Geology, 38 (12) 1059-1062.
- Blundell A, Hannam JA, Dearing JA & Boyle JF (2009) Detecting atmospheric pollution in surface soils using magnetic measurements: A reappraisal using an England and Wales database, Environmental Pollution, 157 (10) 2878-2890.
- Blundell A, Dearing JA, Boyle JF & Hannam JA (2009) Controlling factors for the spatial variability of soil magnetic properties across England and Wales, Earth-Science Reviews, 95 (3-4) 158-188.
- Blundell A, Dearing J A, Boyle J F & Hannam J A (2009) Controlling factors for the spatial variability of soil magnetic susceptibility across England and Wales, Earth-Science Reviews, 95 (3-4) 158-188.
- Hannam JA & Dearing JA (2008) Mapping soil magnetic properties in Bosnia and Herzegovina for landmine clearance operations, Earth and Planetary Science Letters, 274 (3-4) 285-294.
- Hannam JA & Dearing JA (2005) Soil magnetic properties and land-mine detection, Journal of Defence Science, 10 (2) 78-90.
- Spassov S, Egli R, Heller F, Nourgaliev DK & Hannam JA (2004) Magnetic quantification of urban pollution sources in atmospheric particulate matter., Geophysical Journal International, 159 (2) 555-564.
- Harvey AM, Foster GC, Hannam JA & Mather A E (2003) The Tabernas alluvial fan and lake system, southeast Spain: Application of mineral magnetic and pedogenic iron oxide analyses towards clarifying the Quaternary sediment sequences, Geomorphology, 50 (1-3) 151-171.
- Dearing JA, Hannam JA, Anderson AE & Wellington EMH (2001) Magnetic, geochemical and DNA properties of highly magnetic soils in England., Geophysical Journal International, 144 (1) 183-196.
Conference Papers
- Storr T, Simmons RW & Hannam JA (2018) Soil water and available nitrogen during cover crop growth. In: Soil Improvement: Impact of Management Practices on Soil Function and Quality, 2018, Cambridge, 16 October 2018.
- Storr T, Simmons RW & Hannam JA (2017) Do cover crops give short term benefits for soil health?. In: Sustainable Intensification, 2017, Harpenden, 28-30 November 2017.
- Storr T, Simmons R & Hannam J (2017) The use of cover crops in the UK: a survey. In: Sustainable Intensification, 2017, Harpenden, 28-30 November 2017.
- Hannam JA, Van Dam RL & Harmon RS (2009) A synthesis of current knowledge and future directions for soil magnetism research. In: SPIE Defense and Security Symposium, Orlando, Florida, 13 April 2009.
- Hannam JA & Dearing JA (2006) Modeling soil magnetic susceptibility and frequency dependent susceptibility to aid landmine clearance. In: SPIE Defense and Security Symposium, Florida, USA, 17 April 2006.
Books
- Simo I, Constanje R, Fealy R, Hallett SH, Hannam J, Holden N, Jahns G, Jones B, Massey P, Mayr T, McDonald E, Reidy B, Schulte R, Sills P, Spaargaren O, Zawadka J & Creamer RE (2014) Mapping Soils in Ireland. In: GlobalSoilMap: Basis of the global spatial soil information system, CRC Press.
- Keay CA & Hannam JA (2013) Soil Data from the United Kingdom (England and Wales). In: European HYdropedological Data Inventory (EU-HYDI). Weynands M, Montanarella L, Toth G (ed.), Luxembourg: European Union, p. 111-115, ed. JRC 81129.
- Hannam JA, Hollis JM & Jones RJA (2007) SPADE2: The soil profile analytical database for Europe. In: Status and prospect of soil information in south-eastern Europe: soil databases, projects and applications, Office for Official Publications of the European Communities.