Role
As Environmental Team Leader and Principal Lecture in Ecology, Dr Chris Terrell-Nield is responsible for supporting those staff who deliver Biosciences’ environmental content, primarily within BSc (H) Applied Biology. He chairs group meetings of Environmental academic staff and is a member of the Biosciences Management Group, student appeals and academic irregularities panels. He also assists with Admissions and carries out a range of public-facing activities designed to enhance knowledge of Biosciences courses and NTU in general. Apart from environmental teaching, Chris has an extensive involvement in the delivery of the School’s Forensic Science modules and projects.
Networking/Lecture
Please join us on our Clifton Campus for my keynote lecture “An Ancient Woodland in Time and Rhyme”.
Career overview
Before joining NTU Dr Terrell-Nield was an Esmée Fairbairn Postdoctoral researcher within King's College, University of London.
Research areas
Dr Terrell-Nield is a trained entomologist with particular interests in cave biology, carrion colonisation and woodland management.
Areas of research interest include:
- Animal distribution studies (especially Coleoptera): Species identification and distribution mapping at both field level and in specific habitats such as polluted streams and caves
- Carrion decomposition and succession: Monitoring the colonisation and succession of invertebrates on carrion, and factors affecting abundance and invertebrate sequence
- Woodland management: Work on plant and animal development in coppiced woodlands in relation to Dutch elm disease and management for maximising diversity
Dr Terrell-Nield has been involved in the supervision and assessment of many PhD students in subjects as varied as decomposition of remains in caves, control of Leishmania and bee parasites, and analysis of wolf howls. He has supervised to completion seven PhD students, the most recent being Andrew Chick on the effects of nicotine on carrion decomposition. He is also Independent Assessor for PhD projects in freshwater ecology and factors affecting global biodiversity. Opportunities to carry out postgraduate research towards an MPhil/PhD exist and further information may be obtained from the NTU Graduate School.
External activity
- Fellow of the Royal Entomological Society
- Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology
- Fellow of the Higher Education Academy
- Member of the British Ecological Society
- Member of the Cave Research Association
- Director of Creswell Heritage Trust
- Member of several Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust committees, including its Species Recovery Committee and Site Warden for Bunny Old Wood, south Notts.
- Member of the Rushcliffe Nature Conservation Strategy Implementation Group for Rushcliffe Borough Council
- Regular contributor to BBC Radio Nottingham and to the national press (entomological and environmental topics).
- Writes and publishes poetry to illustrate species’ ecology and environmental issues.
- Public lectures for external organisations, e.g.: Derby Natural History Society; Wollaton Natural History Society
- Photography (including for NTU publicity, teaching and research).
Sponsors and collaborators
Recent work has been conducted with the collaboration, funding and / or support of:
- Creswell Heritage Trust
- Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust
- Rushcliffe Country Park (Bioblitz)
Publications
In Defence of Ants. Terrell-Nield, C. 2022. The Conversation (Environment) https://theconversation.com/in-defence-of-ants-186220
There be dragons? Creatures you might find on a real journey to the centre of the Earth. Terrell-Nield, C. 2016. The Conversation (Science and Technology)
Improving individual identification in captive Eastern grey wolves (Canis lupus lycaon) using the time course of howl amplitudes. Root-Gutteridge H, Bencsik M, Chebli M, Gentle LK, Terrell-Nield C, Bourit A and Yarnell RW, Bioacoustics: The International Journal of Animal Sound and its Recording, 2014, 23 (1), 39-53
Virulence loss and amastigote transformation failure determine host cell responses to Leishmania mexicana. Ali KS, Rees RC, Terrell-Nield C and Ali SA, Parasite Immunology, 2013, 35 (12), 441-456
A preliminary study of the surface properties of earthworms and their relations to non-stain behaviour. Gao F, Baraka-Kamali E, Shirtcliffe N and Terrell-Nield C, Journal of Bionic Engineering, 2010, 7 (1), 13-18
The effect of common pesticides on the colonisation and decomposition of carrion by invertebrates. Chick AIR, Cassella JP and Terrell-Nield C, Global Forensic Science Today, 2008, 6, 18-26
The first occurrence of the Ponto-Caspian invader, Hemimysis anomala G.O. Sars, 1907 (Mysidacea) in the UK. Stubbington R, Terrell-Nield CE and Harding P, Crustaceana, 2008, 81 (1), 43-55
Press expertise
- Invertebrates, especially insects and spiders
- Species identification and distribution
- Forensic entomology
- Community analysis and environmental impacts
- Cave biology (arthropods)