Contact Dr Melissa Ladyman

Areas of expertise

  • Explosives and Munitions

Background

Dr Melissa Ladyman graduated from Edinburgh University with an MChem degree in Chemistry with a Year in Europe. Her undergraduate degree included a year placement at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Chimie de Lille where she undertook research into potential medications for tuberculosis and depression. She gained a PhD in the development of Fluorescent Assays for Biological Analysis also from The University of Edinburgh.

Melissa joined Cranfield University in 2015 and works in the Environmental Science Group within the Life Assessment Group in Cranfield Defence Chemistry.

Current activities

The Environmental Sciences group at Cranfield Defence Chemistry is interested in the fate and transport of energetic materials in soil, air and water environments. The group focuses on developing controlled laboratory methods to represent the real environment. Some areas of research include soil columns, dissolution experiments, degradation and weathering, demilitarisation, treatment of contaminated water and risk assessment.

The group has also been involved in coordinating a NATO soil sampling workshop showcasing the Multi-Increment Sampling method at Cranfield University at Shrivenham and COTEC sites. Videos of the event are available at the following web address.

Shorter promotional video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tt7fA0XR7bU&t=45s

Longer educational video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfQ3nnPkUIg&t=3s

The group runs a suite of IEMA accredited environmental courses for defence acquisition (https://www.cranfield.ac.uk/Courses/Short/Defence-and-Security/Environmental-Awareness-and-Compliance-in-Defence), and is involved in teaching on various MSc and short courses including the Explosives, Ordnance and Engineering MSc (https://www.cranfield.ac.uk/courses/taught/explosives-ordnance-engineering).

Publications

Articles In Journals

Books