Education Outreach Trustee
Appointed Trustee: 13th September 2012
Re-appointed: 10th December 2013
Re-appointed: 1st December 2016
Prof Hursthouse is Professor of Environmental Geochemistry and currently Assistant Dean (Research & Enterprise), School of Science & Sport at the University of the West of Scotland and where he co-Directs the Institute for Biomedical & Environmental Health Research. Andrew has worked on expert groups in soil quality for the EU and Scottish Government and in addition to a long association with NSCA/EPUK and EPS, and is a former International President of the Society for Environmental Geochemistry & Health (www.segh.net).
He is a Chartered Chemist (CChem FRSC), and his research applies an “earth-systems” approach to the transport/behaviour of pollutants in the environment (air quality, land degradation and remediation and aquatic biogeochemistry), evaluating the impact on ecosystems and for human health. These have links to policy and knowledge transfer activities which have been focused on the role and evolution of environmental management tools; issues of regulation and sustainability, and in the development of innovative R&D support mechanisms for SMEs across industrial sectors.
Andrew trained as a geochemist before undertaking PhD research on analytical methods to trace long lived radionuclides (principally isotopes of Np and Pu) in coastal regions as a NERC CASE student based at the SURRC (now SUERC), a department of Glasgow University. Following a Post Doc at SURRC, tracing on-land transfer of discharges from Dounreay NPP, he joined Paisley College of Technology (now University of the West of Scotland) as a lecturer in Inorganic Chemistry, then Senior Lecturer and gained a Personal Chair in 2002. He was recently awarded Expert Fellowships by the Chinese Government to undertake research on environmental impact of mining and resource exploitation in Southern China.
Prof Hursthouse retains research and teaching interests in chemistry and chemical analysis applied to environmental sciences and industrial processes.