James is a Senior Lecturer in aquatic ecology with the Freshwater and Estuarine Research Group at the University of Technology Sydney. His research focuses on food webs, water quality and environmental management in freshwater and coastal environments. His main interest is understanding how management approaches can be used to restore and maintain ecosystems and their functions. He has have expertise in food web modelling, environmental flows, plankton, fish, and invertebrate ecology, plastic pollution, and carbon and nutrient biogeochemistry. James has led multiple large-scale projects in collaboration with government and university partners. He has experience implementing environmental reforms and engaging with a diversity of stakeholders from industry and the public sector. James has experience teaching and coordinating units on ecology, aquatic science and environmental management, with specialised skills in interdisciplinary and project unit curriculum development. He is the coordinator for 91121 Aquatic Ecosystems.
James has held previous positions as a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Centre for Applied Water Sciences, University of Canberra, and Lecturer at the University of Sydney. His PhD in Environmental Science was was completed at UTS. He was awarded the 2010 Peter Cullen Scholarship and 2016 Tony Roach Award for best paper by an early career researcher in Estuarine and Marine science. James is the former founder and co-host of Third Degree - Environmental Justice Show on 2SER 107.3 and winner of the 2010 UTS Human Rights Award for Creative Media.