The wildFIRE Lab team is led by Director and founder Professor Claire M. Belcher. Our current team is 8 strong but is always evolving like our research and work, however our core team are:
Director and Founder – Professor Claire M. Belcher
Assistant Director – Dr Sarah J. Baker
Communications Curator and GIS analyst – Romy C. Franz Bodenham, Bsc
Facilities Guru and Technical Lead – Dr Alastair J. Crawford
Prof Claire M. Belcher
Professor Claire M. BelcherClaire is a Professor of wildland fire. She founded the experimental wildFIRE Lab at the University of Exeter in 2012 where it has gained an international reputation for wildfire research. Claire is passionate about understanding the ecology of fire and how fire has shaped the evolutionary history of plants since their appearance on Earth over 300 million years ago. In recent years, her research has turned to a focus on UK fire prone ecosystems, driven by the need to understand fire risk, fire behaviour and fire effects on biodiversity in heathlands and moorlands. She has been an instrumental member of the team building the UKs first fire behaviour prediction tool fireinsite.org and seeks to work with land owners, stake holders and government to ensure the UKs heathlands and moorlands are resilient and pyro-diverse
Dr Sarah J. Baker
Sarah is an Earth scientist with a passion for understanding wildfires—past and present. My journey into wildfire research began with palaeo-fire studies, exploring how ancient wildfires influenced the Earth system and what the fossil fire record reveals about the drivers of fire behaviour and frequency over time.
In recent years, my focus has shifted to modern fire activity, particularly within the UK. I’m especially interested in the flammability properties of UK vegetation, both with respect to wildfire and management burns, and this has led me to become a part of the team compiling this national database of plant specie and assessing their traits and responses to fire.
Romy C. Franz Bodenham, Bsc
Romy is a recent graduate from the University of Exeter, where she studied BSc. Geography including Fire Ecology and Fire Management. She is currently developing ecological field mapping tools to aid the collate and manage spatial biodiversity data.
She is passionate about hazard management, biodiversity monitoring, and conservation, with a strong interest in how ecosystems respond to environmental change. She currently supports our research group focused on wildfire ecology, contributing to projects that investigate plant traits, fire resilience, and the role of fire in habitat management. She hopes to help inform strategies for conserving biodiversity and building more sustainable landscapes.
Dr Alastair J. Crawford
wildFIRE Lab 