Mrs Holly Woo

I am doing a part-time PhD at the OU in the School of Earth, Environment and Ecosystems Sciences, studying the impacts of urbanisation on ancient woodlands. These irreplaceable habitats declined dramatically over the last century with the expansion of agriculture, infrastructure, towns and cities. As urban areas expand to surround woodland remants, these dynamic, complex ecosystems become exposed to impacts such as pollution, habitat fragmentation, introduced species and visitor pressure. I am investigating changes in the ground flora, soils and visitor pressure in urban ancient woodlands, with a focus on Milton Keynes as an example of an area of rapid recent urban development around signficant patches of ancient woodland.

Prior to my PhD, I studied at the University of Cambridge and Imperial College and was a research scholar in biodiversity science at the University of Tokyo. I worked in museum collections management for several years, including work with herbarium specimens at London's Natural History Museum and various regional museums in the West Midlands. Volunteer work on woodland management and botanical surveying inspired me to explore ancient woodland in more detail through postgraduate study.

In 2023-4 I worked as Research Assistant for Citizen Science on the Branching Out Project, to explore and develop new ways of mapping, predicting and communicating the social and cultural values of urban trees. I have been involved with developing an update to Treezilla - a citizen science platform where users can map and record details on trees in UK towns and cities.

I am also currently working on developing a website for the OpenLiving Lab to describe how the OU are using a range of technological tools to monitor and restore woodland and meadow habitats on the OU campus.