Programme overview

Undertake research in a field you’re passionate about and join a project addressing leading challenges in the area while working with some of Europe's leading researchers and academics.

Choose to research at a university ranked and 6th in the UK (QS World University Rankings, 2025) and 2nd in the world for social and environmental impact (THE Impact Rankings, 2024), where 93% of research activity is ‘world leading’ or ‘internationally excellent’ (Research Impact Framework, 2021)

Access some of the best research facilities in the world at the University, through our industry partners, and at hospitals around Greater Manchester.

Benefit from dedicated support throughout your PhD journey, from pre-application to graduation and everything in between, through our Doctoral Academy

Undergo training in transferable skills critical to developing early-stage researchers and professionals through the Doctoral Academy's training programme and progress into a career in research, academia or industry.

Programme description

Our PhD/MPhil Environmental Biology programme enables you to undertake a research project that will improve understanding of Environmental Biology.

Animals, microorganisms and plants live in environments to which they have become adapted through millions of years of evolution.

They often have to respond to changes which may be biotic or abiotic in nature, and, increasingly, to anthropogenic perturbations which have resulted in global environmental change.

To understand how organisms respond and interact with one another in their natural and man-made habitats, a wide spectrum of approaches is employed ranging from molecular biology to population biology.

State-of-the-art facilities for 'controlled environments' are used to regulate climate variables and to study interactions between species. These include controlled environment rooms, animal facilities and insectaries.

Research projects involve both laboratory and field studies in temperate, arctic and tropical habitats.

Examples of areas of investigation include:

seasonal and hormonal regulation of animal behaviour

reproductive strategies of plants

animal & microbes and their evolution

phenotypic plasticity and quantitative genetics

strategies of adaption in a changing world