MDP Faculty & Contributors
Prof. Padraig Carmody (MDP Director/Chair)
Padraig Carmody is a Professor in Geography at TCD, from which he holds both a B.A. in Geography and History and M.Sc in Geography. He completed his Ph.D in Geography from the University of Minnesota in 1998. Subsequently he taught at the University of Vermont, Dublin City University, and St. Patrick’s College, Drumcondra. He also worked as a policy and research analyst for the Combat Poverty Agency in 2002-2003. His research centres on the political economy of globalization in Africa. His teaching interests are in development and economic geography. He has taught both undergraduate and graduate classes on Africa, third world development and globalization, in additional to human environment relations and regional development.
Prof. Carmody coordinates the module Globalisation & African Development, and is Director for the MDP.
Dr. Susan Murphy (Assistant Professor in Development Practice)
Susan is a Lecturer in Development Practice in the School of Natural Sciences (Geography), Trinity College Dublin. Susan's research interests are in sustainable development ethics and issues in social and global justice; and she lectures on Gender, Climate Justice, and Development Research and Practice. She has published in national and international peer-review and scientific journals on matters related to ethics, practice and global development. In 2016 Susan published her first monograph with Springer Studies in Global Justice - Responsibility in an Interconnected World. She is Chair of Oxfam Ireland, and a member of Oxfam International Board of Supervisors. She is also the co-convenor of the British International Studies Association (BISA) Working Group on Ethics and World Politics; and scientific committee member of the UN SDSN International Conference on Sustainable Development (ICSD), hosted annually by the Earth Institute, Columbia University.
Susan completed her Ph.D. at University College Dublin (2012) where she was a School of Politics and International Relations Scholar on the subject of international development and humanitarian ethics. Following completion of her masters’ in politics and international relations (1996), she worked in Industry as a manager with Accenture for a decade before returning to academic research and teaching in 2008. As part of her work, she has managed the design and delivery of 200+ international research projects in countries across Latin America, Africa and Asia, and over 150+ research projects with International Development NGOs in Ireland. Susan is a College Tutor for STEM UG Students and she sits on the School's Research Ethics Committee. Susan has served on the School Athena Swan Gender Equality SAT; PG Teaching and Learning Committee; and as the FEMS faculty representative as a member of University Council and the College International Committee.
Dr. Murphy lectures on Gender & Development; Climate Change: Science Development & Justice; and development research and practice.
Dr. Matthew Saunders
Matthew Saunders is an Assistant Professor in Plant Sciences within the School of Natural Sciences, Trinity College Dublin. He was awarded a Ph.D. in Plant Ecophysiology (2005) and a M.Sc. in Environmental Science (2001) from Trinity College Dublin and has worked as a post-doctoral research fellow in University College Dublin (2006-2012) and the James Hutton Institute, UK (2012-2015). His research interests include the response of plants to changes in their physical, chemical and biological environments and how this information can be used to assess the resilience and adaptive capacity of terrestrial ecosystems to global environmental change. This work utilises an integrated experimental and model-based approach to assess the physiological and environmental processes that regulate plant productivity, carbon sequestration, greenhouse gas dynamics, plant-water relations and energy budgets at the leaf, whole plant and ecosystem scale. Recent projects have focussed on the impacts of land use change, habitat restoration and extreme climatic events on carbon, water and nutrient dynamics in natural and agricultural ecosystems in both temperate and tropical climates. This work has directly contributed to the development of policy relevant, sustainable land management tools that are centred on the role of terrestrial ecosystems in the mitigation of, and adaptation to climate change. He has published in international peer-reviewed journals on matters relating to plant science and environmental change including Global Change Biology, Biogeosciences, Agricultural and Forest Meteorology and Ecology Letters.
Dr Saunders lectures on Sustainable Agriculture & Land Use.
Dr. Federico Cugurullo
Federico Cugurullo is Assistant Professor in Smart and Sustainable Urbanism at Trinity College Dublin. His research is positioned at the intersection of urban geography, political philosophy and experimental urbanism, and explores how ideas of sustainability are cultivated and implemented across geographical spaces, with a focus on projects for eco-cities and smart cities.
Federico has done extensive empirical research in the Middle East and Southeast Asia where he has investigated the sustainability performance of supposedly experimental cities such as Masdar City in Abu Dhabi and Hong Kong. His work has been used by the United Nations and the United Kingdom’s Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA) to foresee future urban challenges and develop preventive policies.
Building upon empirical grounds, Federico’s main theoretical aspiration (also the subject of his forthcoming book) is the development of urban equations for a sustainable urbanism. Other theoretical contributions include the concept of urban eco-modernisation, and the theory of de-composed urbanism and Frankenstein cities.
Before joining Trinity College Dublin, Federico held positions at the University of Manchester, King’s College London and the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Dr. Conor Buggy
Dr Conor Buggy is an Environmental Scientist and Engineer working as Assistant Professor in Occupational and Environmental Studies in the UCD School of Public Health, Physiotherapy and Sports Science. Conor is the Programme Director for the Masters in Occupational Safety and Health and Professional Certificate in Environmental Management programmes. His main research focus is currently on the impact education and training can have in organisational settings to change behaviour in particular cohorts. One study in collaboration with Dr. Seamus Kelly (UCD) focuses on the occupational health management of professional athletes and how occupational health awareness training can lead to better decision making for athletes’ long-term wellbeing. A further study in collaboration with Dr. Susan Murphy (TCD) is focused on the flexibility and impact of adult educational methods and frameworks for professionals working in the healthcare sector.
Another research project is linked his teaching on the TCD Masters in Development Practice. The project, in collaboration with Dr. Gayle McGlynn (TCD), involves a staged evaluation of climate change awareness in the education system of a developing nation, and is run in partnership with DUCE (Dar Es Salaam University College of Education) in Tanzania. The ultimate aim of this project is to prepare an educational package to ensure secondary school teachers of all disciplines can understand climate change and introduce to secondary school students effectively. Conor has been working with the UCD Centre for Safety and Health since 2010. Read Conor’s full research profile here.
Dr. Philip Lawton
Philip Lawton joined Trinity College Dublin as Assistant Professor in Geography in Setember, 2017. His research interests are focused on the intersection between urban economic change, urban policy making and social life in cities. Outputs from his research have included the analysis of residential preferences of creative-knowledge workers (Cities, 2013), the ideal of the 'European city' in Dublin policy making (International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 2014), and the connections between uneven development and suburban transformation in Adamstown, Dublin (European Journal of Urban and Regional Studies, 2018). Prior to joining Trinity College, Philip held positions in Maynooth University, NUI Galway, and Maastricht University. Through these experiences, Philip has sought to develop an approach to teaching that is centred on student discussion and interaction.
Dr. Lawton is the coordinator for Theories of Development
Dr. John McDonagh
Dr. McDonagh holds a BSc in Economics from the London School of Economics and a PhD in Economics from Trinity College, Dublin. He has taught a variety of undergraduate and post-graduate courses, including microeconomics and mathematical and statistical methods. His research interests include historical economic development, particularly in Ireland and Britain, and applied econometrics. He also has experience of working as a professional economist outside of academia on a range of micro and macroeconomic policy issues.
Dr McDonagh lectures on Development Economics.
Prof. Laurence Gill
Laurence Gill is a Professor in Environmental Engineering in the School of Engineering, Trinity College Dublin. His research interests involve studying the fate and transport of both air and water-borne pollutants in the natural and built environment, as well as the development of passive treatment processes. Much of the work involves extensive field studies which are then used to develop mathematical models to gain further insight into the processes. Prior to joining at Trinity College in 1999, he spent several years working in the UK water industry on the design of water and wastewater treatment processes for urban populations.
Prof Gill is the coordinator for Civil Engineering for Sustainable Development.
Dr. Tara Bedi
Tara Bedi is a Marie Curie (CAROLINE) Irish Research Council Post Doctoral Fellow in the Economics Department in Trinity College Dublin, where she is also received her PhD in Development Economics from. Prior to this, she worked with Trócaire, an Irish NGO, leading on policy research, including Leading Edge 2020. Before moving to Ireland, she worked in the Poverty Reduction Group at the World Bank, where she carried out research on impact evaluations, poverty maps and poverty monitoring systems. She received a master’s degree in Public Administration in International Development from the Harvard Kennedy School.
Dr. Bedi lectures on Impact Measurement.
Dr. Jean Wilson
Dr Jean Wilson is a Postgraduate Teaching Fellow in the School of Natural Sciences. Jean’s research interests centre on environmental applications of remote sensing, GIS and spatial analysis, specifically in the context of water resources monitoring and management. Her work has been funded since 2009 under the EPA STRIVE initiative. She has developed novel methodologies in the application of thermal remote sensing and geochemical tracing techniques for localising and assessing groundwater discharge to lakes and coastal waters nationally.
Dr. Wilson is the coordinator for Geographic Information Systems (GIS).