BARIToNE: Sustainable Agriculture and Mycotoxins in Barley (Project code 25D) University of Leeds in United Kingdom

Supervisors

Lead supervisor - Professor Neil Havis, SRUC

Second supervisor - Dr Steve Hoad, SRUC

Industry supervisor - Dr Julian South, Maltsters' Association of Great Britain (MAGB)

Location

This project will be based at SRUC who will also be the degree awarding institution.

The project

This four-year PhD studentship is fully funded by the BARIToNE Collaborative Training Partnership (from Sept. 2025) and offered in partnership between SRUC and MAGB.

Mycotoxins are fungal metabolites found in cereals and other plants. They are toxic to humans so their levels must be carefully managed in food and drink. The project aims to understand the relationship between sustainable agriculture practices and mycotoxin production in barley. It will then use the knowledge gained to devise strategies for control of mycotoxins in regenerative farming systems. The project will encompass field studies, both at the commercial and experimental scale. Aspects of regenerative farming that will be included for study are tailored agrochemical use, direct drilling of seeds, pros and cons of field margins and modifying the crop rotation. The project will include samples from a wide geography since there are differences due to soil and climatic variables. In addition, there are differences in agriculture support mechanisms across UK regions which will impact the agricultural methods employed and these will be compared within the project. The project will utilise existing analytical methods for mycotoxin analysis at a partner laboratory, which have been developed over many years and are readily available at the scale required for the project.

How to apply

Applications to the BARIToNE CTP programme are made via the form which can be found on our website: https://baritone.hutton.ac.uk/how-to-apply/