The strategy to accomplish the scientific mission of PE&RC is by focusing on the following components:

• Understand the complexity of (eco)systems and derive unifying concepts at various spatial and temporal scales;

• Assess how these concepts vary between different spatial-temporal scales and different levels of biological organisation and complexity;

• Develop quantitative approaches in which observation, experimentation and modelling are combined and different scales of observation are quantitatively connected and synthesised;

• Integrate the different disciplines required and design novel production and land use systems in relevant temporal order and spatial configurations. 

Four, partly overlapping, research themes have been identified.

The focus of each theme is: 

• Re-design of Agroecosystems: To assess and design sustainable agroecosystems focused on the provision of multiple ecosystem services, resilience capacity and equitable management of natural resources contributing to global food security, resource conservation and societal well-being.

• Ecology, Biodiversity & Conservation: To generate insights into ecological processes and interactions and use these to design effective strategies for the protection, restoration and sustainable use of ecosystems and biodiversity.

• One Health: To explore ecological, evolutionary, and molecular processes to improve the health of organisms and the environment they live in.

• Data and Engineering Science: To provide the methods, technologies and tools to solve complex societal problems through integration of novel data acquisition tools, quantitative and qualitative modelling with domain knowledge.