Evolution in tooth and claw: exploring the relationship between the radiation of marsupial herbivores and late Cenozoic climate change. Establishing how animals responded to past environmental changes is essential for understanding the ecology of modern species and managing them in light of contemporary climatic trends. By applying several novel analytical methods this project will unravel the links between the radiation of Australian marsupials and key stages in climatic evolution.
Faunal responses to environmental change and isolation on an Australian land-bridge island. Establishing how faunas responded to past isolation and environmental changes offers great potential for predicting long-term impacts of habitat fragmentation. By combining novel methods we will track extinction rates, diet and body-size shifts on Kangaroo Island, the only known land-bridge island with a fossil record spanning the past 100,000 years.
Multi-Country Study on Health Effects of Bushfire Air Pollution. Catastrophic bushfires are a major natural disaster, causing serious air pollution. However, aligning bushfire air pollution and public health policies becomes a significant challenge, because limited studies are available on relationships between bushfire air pollution and human health, particularly for the prolonged exposure. We will characterize the nature of the relationships between bushfire air pollution and mortality/morbidi ....Multi-Country Study on Health Effects of Bushfire Air Pollution. Catastrophic bushfires are a major natural disaster, causing serious air pollution. However, aligning bushfire air pollution and public health policies becomes a significant challenge, because limited studies are available on relationships between bushfire air pollution and human health, particularly for the prolonged exposure. We will characterize the nature of the relationships between bushfire air pollution and mortality/morbidity by developing a multi-country study; and estimate the burden of diseases attributed to bushfire air pollution. This project will provide essential scientific evidence to policy-makers and stakeholders in the development, prioritization and implementation of health protection strategies and policies.
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The evolution of specialised orchid pollination and its reversibility. This project aims to determine the changes in key floral volatile compounds underpinning pollination transitions, identify their molecular basis, and understand the ecological processes favouring reversals away from extreme specialisation. By focusing on pollination of sexually deceptive Australian orchids, this project would be the first to determine the molecular, chemical and behavioural basis of evolutionary reversals to ....The evolution of specialised orchid pollination and its reversibility. This project aims to determine the changes in key floral volatile compounds underpinning pollination transitions, identify their molecular basis, and understand the ecological processes favouring reversals away from extreme specialisation. By focusing on pollination of sexually deceptive Australian orchids, this project would be the first to determine the molecular, chemical and behavioural basis of evolutionary reversals to more generalised strategies in a group of plants facing high risk of pollinator extinction. The expected outcome, a mechanistic understanding of how pollination transitions occur, would be internationally ground-breaking, and provide crucial insights to protect this diverse but highly threatened group of plants.Read moreRead less
Identifying potential trade-offs of adapting to climate change. Climate change and marine heatwaves introduce strong, directional selection for heat tolerance which, in turn, alters the genetic composition and diversity of marine species. While this may facilitate adaptation to warmer conditions, reduced genetic diversity may limit resilience or cause maladaptation to additional stressors. This project will focus on habitat-forming kelps and will aim to both assess the negative consequences of r ....Identifying potential trade-offs of adapting to climate change. Climate change and marine heatwaves introduce strong, directional selection for heat tolerance which, in turn, alters the genetic composition and diversity of marine species. While this may facilitate adaptation to warmer conditions, reduced genetic diversity may limit resilience or cause maladaptation to additional stressors. This project will focus on habitat-forming kelps and will aim to both assess the negative consequences of rapid selection and to disentangle the mechanisms of climate adaptation. Through a powerful combination of controlled experiments on known genotypes and cutting-edge transcriptomic approaches, this project will transform our understanding of the adaptability of foundation species in a rapidly changing ocean.
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Genes to ecosystems: drivers of resilience in underwater marine forests. This project seeks to determine if population connectivity and thermal stress limits the ecological performance and capacity for biological adaptation of seaweed forests to environmental change. The rates of warming in Australia’s temperate marine environments are among the fastest in the world, threatening seaweed forests that support rich marine life and generate substantial socioeconomic values. By integrating studies of ....Genes to ecosystems: drivers of resilience in underwater marine forests. This project seeks to determine if population connectivity and thermal stress limits the ecological performance and capacity for biological adaptation of seaweed forests to environmental change. The rates of warming in Australia’s temperate marine environments are among the fastest in the world, threatening seaweed forests that support rich marine life and generate substantial socioeconomic values. By integrating studies of connectivity among seaweed forests along replicate coastlines on both sides of the Australian continent, with field and breeding experiments, this project expects to expose the role of genetic diversity in mediating ecological resilience to rapid environmental change.Read moreRead less