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ARC Super Science Fellow, James Cook University

My broad scientific interest lies in informing the conservation and management of threatened marine mega-fauna in a changing climate. For this I use a range of approaches including spatial risk assessments and systematic conservation and management planning. Most of my research to date has focused on using ecological and biological data to improve the management of marine mega-fauna, especially sea turtles, as climate change progresses. My work draws together a wide range of disciplines (including ecology, biology, geology, conservation policy, and climate modelling) and I often work closely with various stakeholders on interdisciplinary research topics and management issues. Increasingly my research is moving beyond the case study approach towards a 'big picture', where I aim to provide decision support tools to aid managers to prioritize their efforts and make informed decisions about the conservation of marine mega-fauna in the face of climate change. During my PhD, I investigated the vulnerability of the northern Great Barrier Reef (nGBR) green turtle population to climate change. One of the outcomes was the development of a systematic and comprehensive framework to assess how multiple climatic processes will affect sea turtle nesting grounds at a population scale. This framework was the first to asses systematically how sea turtle nesting grounds will be affected by multiple climatic processes and provided a new direction for future research I recently started as an ARC Super Science postdoctoral fellow in Program 6 (Conservation Planning for a Sustainable Future) where I aim to develop systematic priorities for the management of marine mega-fauna to increase their resilience to climate change.

Experience

  • 2010–present
    Post Doctoral Fellow, ARC Centre of Excellence fo Coral Reef Studies

Education

  • 2010 
    James Cook Univeristy, PhD, cum laude