Queen'S University Marine Laboratory

QUB Marine Laboratory (QML), is the marine research station in Portaferry, Northern Ireland

QML is located in Portaferry at the entrance of beautiful Strangford Lough, a large enclosed, marine lagoon (150 km2) opening into the Irish Sea. We are approximately one hour drive from the main QUB campus in Belfast.

Strangford Lough is a Special Area of Conservation under the European Union Habitats Directive. The marine flora and fauna in the vicinity of Portaferry are among the most diverse in the North Altantic; Portaferry is located in close proximity to an extraordinary diversity of habitats, from tidal mudflats inside Strangford Lough to the exposed coast of the Irish sea outside the Lough. The entrance to Strangford Lough is a narrow channel that experiences high speed tidal fluctuations, the whole volume of the Lough is exchanged every two weeks through a passage less than 1 km wide. The Narrows is the site of an experimental commericial tidal energy generator, SeaGen, operated by Marine Current Turbines.

Students and Postgraduate Researchers at QML conduct fieldwork and research on a wide variety of subjects including Marine Ecology, Evolutionary Biology, Sustainable Energy Resources and Tidal Engineering.