Jo Barnes joined the Air Quality Management Resource Centre (AQMRC) at UWE as a Research Associate in August 2008 following a very enjoyable and rewarding four-year “apprenticeship” at the Air Quality Unit (AQU) at Cornwall College.

Jo graduated with a First Class BSc (Hons) Environmental Resource Management from Cornwall College (University of Plymouth) in 2004 and subsequently completed a part-time Masters degree in Geographical Information Science (GISc) by distance learning from Birkbeck College, University of London in 2007.  Her MSc dissertation “GIS mapping of nitrogen dioxide dispersion in Cornwall, UK” (Barnes 2006) customised the SAVIAH regression model (Briggs et al. 1997; 2000) to predict concentrations of traffic-related pollutants between monitored locations in a Cornish town using GIS.  Jo has just started a part-time PhD at UWE posing the question: "Is Local Air Quality Management a successful strategy in achieving selected EU Limit Values?".

Whilst working for the AQU, Jo successfully managed two EU-funded projects establishing baseline levels of airborne particulate arsenic from the resuspension of contaminated mine spoil, and investigating the extent of nitrogen dioxide hotspots in three Cornish towns undergoing redevelopment.  In addition to project management Jo helped to coordinate the Cornwall Air Quality Forum (CAQF) and a multitude of long-term air quality monitoring programmes throughout Cornwall.

As well as researching air quality and GIS, Jo is also the Honorary Secretary of the Royal Society of Chemistry’s Environmental Chemistry Group and has assisted in coordinating the annual Distinguished Guest Lecture and producing the biannual ECG Bulletin.

She has also developed an HE level 2 module in GIS at Cornwall College and acted as the Access to HE Coordinator for six National Open College Network courses delivered at the Camborne campus.

Jo’s outside interests include sailing, swimming, cycling, 'allotmenteering', walking the rugged Cornish coast paths, moors and beautiful wooded valleys (and shopping!).

References

Barnes J., 2006: GIS mapping of nitrogen dioxide dispersion in Cornwall, UK. MSc thesis, Birkbeck College, University of London.

Briggs D.J., Collins S., Elliott P., Fischer P., Kingham S., Lebret E., Pryl K., Van Reeuwijk H., Smallbone K. and Van Der Veen A., 1997: Mapping urban air pollution using GIS: a regression-based approach. International Journal of Geographical Information Science, 11, 699-718.

Briggs D.J., de Hoogh C., Gulliver J., Wills J., Eliotta P., Kingham S. and Smallbone K., 2000: A regression-based method for mapping traffic-related air pollution: application and testing in four contrasting urban environments.  The Science of the Total Environment, 253, 151-167.