Mr Bob Wasson

Contacts

Emeritus Professor

Professor Robert (Bob) Wasson is a geomorphologist with a PhD from Macquarie University, postdoctoral positions at the University of Auckland and the Australian National University (ANU). He has studied desert dunes, palaeoenvironmental change on centennial to millennial timescales, fluvial systems, mass movements, cross-disciplinary methods, and most recently extreme flood histories and mitigation strategies. He has held senior positions in Australia's CSIRO, and at the Australian National University (Head of Geography, Director Centre for Environmental and Resource Studies, Dean of Science) and Charles Darwin University (Deputy Vice Chancellor Research). He joined the National University of Singapore (NUS) in 2011 where he worked in the Geography Department, the Asia Research Institute and the Institute of Water Policy at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy. He has done research in Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Indonesia, Timor-Leste, Malaysia, India, Nepal, Pakistan, China, Myanmar and Thailand.

Research interests

  • Freshwater Ecology
  • Environmental Impact Assessment
  • Sedimentology
  • Global Change Biology
  • Environmental Rehabilitation (Excl. Bioremediation)
  • Surfacewater Hydrology
  • Geomorphology And Regolith And Landscape Evolution
  • Land Capability And Soil Degradation
  • Environmental Science And Management
  • Das, S, Sheth, A, Bansal, P et al. 2022, 'A statistical comparison of flood-related economic damage in Indian states with reflections on policy implications', International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, vol. 72, no. 2.
  • Jain, V, Wasson, R, McCulloch, M et al. 2022, 'Controls on sediment provenance in the Baghmati river catchment, Central Himalaya, India', Journal of Earth System Science, vol. 131, no. 1.
  • Li, D, Lu, X, Walling, D et al. 2022, 'High Mountain Asia hydropower systems threatened by climate-driven landscape instability', Nature Geoscience, vol. 15, pp. 520ââ¬â530.
  • Wasson, R & Weaver, D 2021, 'Sediment budgets for small salinized agricultural catchments in Southwest Australia and implications for phosphorus transport', Water, vol. 13, no. 24.
  • Nguyen, C, Moss, P, Wasson, R et al. 2021, 'Environmental change since the Last Glacial Maximum: palaeo-evidence from the Nee Soon Freshwater Swamp Forest, Singapore', Journal of Quaternary Science, vol. 37, no. 4, pp. 707-719pp.
  • Barrows, T, Mills, S, Fitzsimmons, K et al. 2021, 'Low-altitude periglacial activity in southeastern Australia during the late Pleistocene', Quaternary Research, vol. 107, pp. 125ââ¬â146.
  • Wasson, R, Smithers, S, Saynor, M et al. 2021, 'Comment on “Recasting geomorphology as a landscape scienceâ€? by Slaymaker et al. (2021)', Geomorphology, vol. 389, pp. 1-2.
  • Srivastava, P, Lim, H & Wasson, R 2021, 'Why are the builders and operators of dams and hydels in the Hindu Kush–Karakoram–Himalaya so poorly prepared for hydroclimatic hazards?', Current Science, vol. 121, no. 12, pp. 1549-1552.
  • Ziegler, A, Wasson, R, Sundriyal, Y et al. 2021, 'A call for reducing tourism risk to environmental hazards in the Himalaya', Environmental Hazards, vol. online.
  • Wasson, R, Saynor, M & Lowry, J 2021, 'The natural denudation rate of the lowlands near the Ranger mine, Australia: A target for mine site rehabilitation', Geomorphology, vol. 389, p. 11.
  • Wasson, R, Ziegler, A, Lim, H et al. 2021, 'Episodically volatile high energy non-cohesive river-floodplain systems: New information from the Ping River, Thailand, and a global review', Geomorphology, vol. 382.
  • Bhardwaj, A, Wasson, R, Winston T. L., C et al. 2021, 'High-intensity monsoon rainfall variability and its attributes: a case study for Upper Ganges Catchment in the Indian Himalaya during 1901-2013', Natural Hazards, vol. 105, pp. 2907-2936.
  • Wasson, R, Saikia, A, Bansal, P et al. 2020, 'Flood Mitigation, Climate Change Adaptation, and Technological Lock-in in Assam', Ecology, Economy and Society - the INSEE, vol. 3, no. 2, pp. 83 - 104pp.
  • McWilliam, A, Wasson, R, Rouwenhorst, J et al. 2020, 'Disaster Risk Reduction, modern science and local knowledge: Perspectives from Timor-Leste', International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, vol. 50, pp. 1-10.
  • Saynor, M, Wasson, R, Erskine, W et al. 2020, 'Holocene palaeohydrology of the East Alligator River, for application to mine site rehabilitation, Northern Australia', Quaternary Science Reviews, vol. 249, pp. 1-14.
  • Wasson, R 2005, 'Environmental earth science', in R.Q.Grafton, L.Robin & RJ Wasson (ed.), Understanding the environment: bridging the disciplinary divides, UNSW Press, Sydney, pp. 113-129.
  • Newell, B, Crumley, C, Hassan, N et al. 2005, 'A conceptual template for integrative human-environment research', Global Environmental Change - Human and Policy Dimensions, vol. 15, pp. 299-307.
  • Steffen, W, Sanderson, A, Tyson, P et al., eds, 2004, Global Change and the Earth System: A Planet under pressure, Springer, Germany.
  • Worthy, M & Wasson, R 2004, 'Fire as an agent of geomorphic change in Southeastern Australia: implications for water quality in the Australian Capital Territory', CRC LEME Regional Regolith Symposia 2004, ed. Ian C. Roach, CRC LEME, Perth, W.A, pp. 417-8.
  • Wasson, R 2003, 'Connectivity', in Cary, G., Lindenmayer, D., and Dovers, S. (ed.), Australia burning: fire ecology, policy and management issues, CSIRO Publishing, Melbourne, pp. 166-169.
  • Wasson, R 2003, 'Effective policy interventions in environmental systems using material budgets', in Stephen Dovers, David I. Stern and Michael Young (ed.), New Dimensions in Ecological Economics: Integrated Approaches to People and Nature, Edward Elgar Publishing, Cheltenham, UK, pp. 176-192.
  • Wasson, R 2003, 'A sediment budget for the Ganga-Brahmaputra catchment', Current Science, vol. 84, no. 8, pp. 1041-1047.
  • Wasson, R & Claussen, M 2002, 'Earth system models: a test using the mid-Holocene in the Southern Hemisphere', Quaternary Science Reviews, vol. 21, pp. 819-824.
  • Wasson, R 2002, 'A longer-than-usual view of natural resource management on the Indo-Gangetic Plain: towards a dynamic framework of analysis', in Yash P. Abrol (ed.), Land Use -- Historical persectives: focus on Indo-Gangetic Plains, Allied Publishers, New Delhi, pp. 173-188.
  • Visser, F, Roth, C, Wasson, R et al 2002, 'Quantifying sediment sources in lowlying sugarcane land: a sediment budget approach', The Structure, Function and Management Implications of Fluvial Sedminentary Systems, ed. Dyer, F J, Thoms, M C, and Olley, J M, International Association of Hydrological Sciences, Wallingford UK, pp. 169-175.
  • Wasson, R 2002, 'Sedminent budgets, dynamics, and variability: new approaches and techniques', The Structure, Function and Management Implications of Fluvial Sedminentary Systems, ed. Dyer, F J, Thoms, M C, and Olley, J M, International Association of Hydrological Sciences, Wallingford UK, pp. 471-478.
  • Srivastava, P, Juyal, N, Singhvi, A et al 2001, 'Luminescence chronology of river adjustment and incision of Quarternary sediments in the alluvial plain of the Sabarmati River, north Gujarat, India', Geomorphology, vol. 36, pp. 217-229.
  • Wasson, R & Sidorchuk, A 2000, 'History for soil conservation and catchment management', in unknown (ed.), Environmental History and Policy: Still Settling Australia, Oxford University Press, Melbourne, pp. 97-117.
  • Wasson, R 2000, 'Riparian vegetation and river channel size', Natural Resource Management, vol. 3, no. 1, pp. 3-7.