People
The STORY team
Dr James Hanrahan
Director
james.hanrahan@atu.ie
Dr James Hanrahan is the director of the UNWTO Atlantic Sustainable Tourism Observatory Ireland and STORYATU. He has been a Sustainable tourism lecturer and researcher at ATU for over 20 years. He has lectured in higher education across Ireland, New Zealand, Hawaii, Bulgaria, California, and Britain. One of James key strengths is postgraduate supervision and he has supervised many PhDs to completion in wide range of topics such as: sustainable tourism management, sustainable tourism indicators, measuring and monitoring tourism carbon footprint, tourism entrepreneurship, event management and biosecurity. Currently he is supervising PhDs in sustainable tourism and AI, supply chain management, circular tourism and smart digital solutions for net zero destinations. James has worked on many European-funded projects including the Interreg Atlantic Areas project on Polycentric Tourism and the Interreg Europe project on Tourism as a Service: a 360 tourism experience. Prior to his academic career he worked as a tour guide, tour operator, tourism manager and, tourism consultant.
Professor Gary Kerr
Head of Department of Marketing, Tourism and Sport at ATU Sligo
Research interests: Critical Event Studies, Festival & Event Management; EDI and Sustainability for Festivals; Festival Curation; Science Festivals; PI on how festivals & culture/heritage venues can become more accessible for people living with dementia.
Dr Domhnall Melly
Principal Investigator
Research Interests: Tourism and Biosecurity, Sustainable Tourism, Tourism Planning and Development, Festival and Event Management, Regenerative tourism.
Dr John Carty
Principal Investigator
Research Interests: Sustainable tourism, Regenerative tourism, Work-based learning, Dark sky tourism, Tourism policy and strategy, Experiential tourism, Higher education engagement
Dr Catalin Anton
Postdoctoral Researcher
Research Interests: Sustainability and strategic management, environmental and climate governance, climate resilience and adaptation, integrated coastal and marine management, community resilience and stakeholder participation, participatory decision-making and Living Labs.
Dr Conor McTiernan
Principal Investigator
Research Interests: Sustainable tourism policy development, trust, knowledge management, tourism networks, sustainable tourism certification systems, tourism AI and digitalisation.
Diarmuid Ó Conghaile
Principal Researcher
Research Interests: Rural and Island Tourism, Heritage Tourism, Community Centred Tourism Development, Sustainable Tourism Destination Management, Indicators and Planning.
Dr Deidre Byrne
Staff Researcher
Research Interests: Social research methods, sustainable tourism, the sociology of children, the sociology of home and the sociology of food.
Dr Ciarán Ó hAnnracháin
Principal Investigator
Research Interests: Global Higher Education Policy and Transnational Tourism Education; Academia / Industry Collaboration in Talent Management, Training and Development; Education for Sustainable Development.
Dr Sarah Berthaud
Principal Investigator
Research Interests: Language teaching & learning, bilingualism & multilingualism, translation & interpreting, language policy, second language acquisition, sustainability in language education, fashion and textile studies.
Jacinta Dalton
Head of Department for Culinary Arts & Service
Research Interests: Gastronomy tourism, Sustainable food procurement, sustainability skills for tourism SME’s, food as cultural heritage, local food systems and sustainable communities, food education.
Dr Dorothy Bird
Lecturer in Marketing and Tourism, ATU Donegal
Research interests: experiential marketing, consumer behaviour and marketing, entrepreneurship, and market and social science research.
Dr. Charles Alves de Castro
Lecturer in Modern and Digital Marketing, ATU Sligo
Research Interests: Marketing, Social Media Marketing, Digital Marketing, AI Applied to Marketing, Digital Transformation within Organisations & Multidisciplinary Business & Social Sciences Research.
Gary Dempsey
Principal Investigator
Research interests: Digital Humanities, Community Heritage Management, Heritage Policy, Traditional Skills Training, Digital Heritage Literacy, Serious Gaming, Reality Capture, Heritage Visualisation
Dr.Mary McGuckin
Lecturer in Strategy and Tourism, ATU
Research Interests: Strategic management and governance, cultural and literary tourism, festival and event strategy, destination development, and sustainable tourism.
Post Graduate Researchers
Fiona McKenna
PhD Researcher
Research Interests: Sustainable tourism destination management, Sustainable tourism indicators, Sustainable tourism planning, Environmental Sustainability, GIS mapping, Tourism and biodiversity conservation
Colm Barcoe
PhD Researcher
Research Interests: Sustainable Tourism, Destination Management using tourism indicators, Sustainable Tourism, Planning, Using SMART technologies to support sustainable Tourism
Anita Conefrey
MA/PhD Researcher
Research Interests: Tourism impacts, Sustainable tourism destination management, Sustainable tourism planning and policy development, Tourist behaviour, Tourism emissions, Tourism decarbonisation strategies
Neeta Israni
PhD Researcher
Research Interests: Sustainable Tourism Inclusion, Diversity and Discrimination, Tourism and Technology.
Sahar Attari
PhD Researcher
Research Interests: Sustainable tourism, Hotel Sustainablity, Tourism supply chain, Destination planning, Digital marketing and hospitality.
Bridget Reape
PhD Researcher
Research Interests: Smart Technology in Tourism, Tourist Behaviours, Sustainable Tourism, Smart Technology to improve Tourism,Destination Management, Tourist Profiling
Finn van der Aar
PhD Researcher
Research Interests: Marine wildlife tourism, sustainable tourism, marine social science, marine conservation, coastal community resilience, open science, blue economy development, inshore fisheries.
Researchers
Mary O’Keeffe
Researcher
Research Interests: Heritage Tourism & Social Value, Community Tourism Tourism Service Quality, Tourism Destination Management.
Dr Elizabeth McKenzie
Principal Researcher
Research Interests: Market-oriented new product development, Food product development, Food related SMEs, Food marketing, Seafood development, Food and beverage tourism.
Catherine White
Post Grad Researcher
Research Interests: Food and Beverage tourism, Emerging tourism sectors, Sustainable tourism, Tourism’s effect on the community.
Ulrich Hoeche
Principal Investigator
Research Interests: Culinary innovation, food product development, food labelling packaging and marketing, digitalisation in education, blended learning, universal design, foraging, wild food preservation.
Eamonn Hoult
Principal Investigator
Research Interests: Culinary sustainability, culinary innovation, food product development, food growing, production and preservation, food health and medicinal uses. Digitalisation in education, universal design for learning.
Clare Newman
Principal Investigator
Research Interests: Sustainability, food science, sensory science, nutrition, I.T, new product development, sustainability technologies & techniques, digital systems, brand development, data analysis, culinary arts, food safety, food safety training and food education.
Dr Francesco Noci
Principal Investigator
Research Interests: Physical and chemical aspects of food quality, sensory and consumer science, flavour science, sustainability of food systems, new product development, valorisation of underused, innovative and sustainable ingredients, entomophagy, circular eating, seafood and health
Mary Reid
Principal Investigator
Research Interests: Sustainability, Waste food Management, New Product Development in the Culinary Industry, Pastry dietary requirements (plant Based) Nutrition in Culinary Arts. Modern technologies within the food Industry. Culinary Innovation. Blended Learning.
Dr Susanne O’Reilly
Principal Investigator
Research Interests: Sustainable tourism destinations, holidays, family capital, social tourism, qualitative research methods and attractions.