Dr Joseph J Williams

Lecturer
BSc Geography (University of Southampton, 2006) 


PhD (The Open University, 2011)
Photograph of Dr Joseph J Williams.

Contact

Email: jow48@aber.ac.uk
Office: E11
Phone: +44 (0)1970 622580
Fax: +44 (0)1970 622659

Responsibilities

  • BSc Geography Degree Scheme Leader (from start of Semester 2)
  • Field Safety Advisor
  • Undergraduate admissions tutor

Teaching Areas

Contribute to:

  • The Atmosphere and Water Cycle (EA12210)
  • Reading The Ice Age Record (GG21110)
  • Palaeoenvironmental Change Beyond the Ice Sheets (GG33120)
  • People, Climate And Environment: (GG33720)
  • Geography Tutorial (GG22110)
  • Geography Dissertation (GG34040)
  • Geography Fieldwork

Research

Group Affiliation:

Quaternary and Recent Environmental Change Research Group

 

Research Interests: 

Joe’s research is focused on Quaternary environmental change, vegetation dynamics and their interactions with human activity. He specializes in multi-proxy investigations of palaeolimnological data, especially the analysis of pollen, chironomids, charcoal, fungal spores and geochemical/geophysical markers. His research is interdisciplinary and recent topics include:

  • Human-climate-vegetation interactions in tropical Andean ecosystems.
  • Long-term ecosystem changes in the grassland-forest ecotone.
  • Biogeochemical cycling and the vulnerability and resilience of terrestrial and aquatic systems to disturbance events.
  • Palaeo-ecosystem services and the role of palaeoecology in conservation management.

In addition, Joe has interests in the development of microfossil analysis, statistical analysis of palaeoenvironmental data and ancient human cultures (particularly the Tiwanaku and Inca). 

Biography

Joe graduated from the University of Southampton with a BSc degree in Geography (2006), with interests in Quaternary environmental change, environmental biology and arctic/alpine geomorphology. He was award the Florence Miller Prize for his undergraduate research project; a geobotanical study of montane plants species in the Ben Lawers mountain range, Scotland, which was inspired by his interests in high elevation/mountain ecosystems.

He obtained his PhD from the Open University in 2011, in partnership with the Natural History Museum, London.  His doctoral research involved travel to the Bolivian and Ecuadorian Tropical Andes where he obtained sediment cores from high elevation (>3300 m asl) lakes. Cores were analysed using a multi-proxy palaeoenvironmental approach to investigate the history of Polylepis woodland abundance in eastern Bolivia and the interactions of climate, vegetation and pre-Columbian peoples.

He undertook postdoctoral research at Kansas State University, investigating the long-term dynamics of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems in response to climatic and anthropogenic disturbances via the use of biological and biogeochemical sedimentary markers. His research involved sites in the northern USA as well as a global synthesis.

Joe joined the Institute of Geography and Earth Sciences at Aberystwyth in September 2012 as a lecturer in Physical Geography.

Additional Interests

Professional Memberships

  • Member of the American Geophysical Union (AGU)
  • Member of the British Ecological Society (BES)
  • The American Quaternary Association (AMQUA)
  • Quaternary Research Association (QRA)
  • International Paleolimnology Association (IPA)

Staff Publications

Peer Reviewed Book Chapters & Journal Articles

2012

  1. Williams, J.J., Brooks, S.J. and Gosling, W.D. 2012. Response of chironomids to late Pleistocene and Holocene environmental change in the eastern Bolivian Andes. Journal of Paleolimnology, 48, 485-501. DOI

2011

  1. Williams, J.J., Gosling, W.D., Brooks, S.J, Coe, A.L. and Xu, S. Vegetation, climate and fire in the eastern Andes (Bolivia) during the last 18,000 years.Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology, 312, 115-126. DOI
  2. Williams, J.J., Gosling, W.D., Coe, A.L., Brooks, S.J. and Gulliver, P. Four thousand years of environmental and human activity change in the Cochabamba Basin, Bolivia. Quaternary Research, 76, 58-68. DOI

 

Selected Conference Proceedings

2012

  1. Williams, J.J., McLauchlan, K.K, Mueller, J.R. and Myrbo, A.E. Ecosystem development following deglaciation: a new sedimentary record from Devils Lake, WI. American Quaternary Association. Duluth, MN, USA.
  2. Williams, J. J., K. McLauchlan, and J. A. Harrington Jr. 2012. Past environmental change in the Great Plains: Lessons from the past for the future. NSF EPSCoR Conference on Climate and Agriculture: Meeting the Needs for Kansas, Manhattan, KS, USA.
  3. Williams, J.J. Environmental and human activity change in the Cochabamba Basin, Bolivia. The Quaternary Research Association: Annual Discussion Meeting. Hampshire, UK.

2011

  1. Williams, J.J., Gosling, W.D. Dynamic biogeography of Polylepis woodlands: insights from palaeoecology. British Ecological Society: Forests and Global Change symposium. University of Cambridge, UK.

2010

  1. Williams, J.J., Gosling, W.D., Coe, A.L. and Brooks, S.J. 18,000 year of environmental change in the Eastern Cordillera of the Bolivian Andes. American Geophysical Union. San Francisco, CA, USA.
  2. Williams, J.J., Gosling, W.D., Coe, A.L. and Brooks, S.J. Environmental change in the Bolivian Andes: A 4000 year history of burning, herding and wet-dry climate oscillations. Natural History Museum Conference. London, UK.

2009

  1. Williams, J.J., Brooks, S.J. and Gosling, W.D. Chironomids of the eastern Bolivian Andes. 9th Subfossil Chironomid Workshop. Copenhagen, Denmark.

 

Other

2011

Press release: ‘Research on dung fungus sheds light on pre-Incan populations in Bolivia’, May 17th. http://www3.open.ac.uk/media/fullstory.aspx?id=21240.