Advisory Board and Editors Ecology
Darren Norris
Lecturer at the Federal University of Amapá, Brazil. My research interests are broad and are currently focused on the conservation of biodiversity and traditional livelihoods around waterways that traverse political (national and international), cultural and ecological boundaries. I am particularly interested in inter-disciplinary approaches, comprising population and community ecology, population biology, landscape and spatial statistics.
Wayne A. O'Connor
Dr O’Connor is a Senior Principal Research Scientist and Research Leader for Aquaculture at Fisheries New South Wales’ Port Stephens Fisheries Institute. His undergraduate studies were undertaken at Newcastle University and he received his PhD from the University of Technology, Sydney, working on aspects of scallop physiology and reproductive biology. He has 30 years experience in Aquaculture research and has worked on a variety programs including algal culture and the development of propagation techniques for a number of molluscs such as oysters (edible and pearl), scallops, mussels and clams. Currently, Dr O’Connor leads molluscan research programs that range from the development of selective breeding techniques and triploid induction to environmental impact and ecotoxicological evaluations. Dr O'Connor is a member of the editorial boards for the journals Aquaculture and Aquaculture Research. Molluscan Research and Water. He is a Conjoint Professor in Life Sciences at Newcastle University, an Adjunct Professor in Genecology at the University of the Sunshine Coast and a Visiting Fellow at Macquarie University.
Sebastian Oberst
Dr Oberst works as Associate Professor at the Centre for Audio, Acoustics and Vibration (CAAV) at the University of Technology, Sydney, and is head of the Biogenic dynamics group conducting research in bioacoustics, complex dynamics, and acoustic/biogenic (meta-)materials. His research is applied to the eusociality of insects, (primarily termites, but also bees) and the structures they build, extending to their vibro-acoustic communication signals following the noise control engineering principle. Nonlinear time series analysis or methods used in engineering and physics are key elements of his research applied to the life sciences, especially behavioural ecology.
Jörg Oehlmann
Graduated as Dr. rer. nat. at University Münster in 1994. Habilitation at the International Graduate School Zittau in 1998. 2001-2004: Full professor (C3) for Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Goethe University Frankfurt. Since 2004 full professor (C4) for Aquatic Ecotoxicology at Goethe University Frankfurt.
Head of the Department Aquatic Ecotoxicology and the Master's Programme in Environmental Sciences at Goethe University.
Primary research interests: Biological effects monitoring, endocrine active chemicals, pharmaceuticals and personal care products in the environment, effects of microplastics on aquatic organisms, development of an integrated water resource management.
Karen Osborn
Midwater biologist by way of Western Washington University, Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI), University of California Berkeley, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History.
Thiago Parente
Scientist in Public Health at the Laboratory of Functional Genomics and Bioinformatics at the Oswaldo Cruz Institute (IOC, Fiocruz), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Scientific coordinator of the Institutional Bioinformatics Platform. CNPq Level 2 Research Productivity Scholar (Genetics). Permanent professor at the Graduate program on Systems and Computational Biology IOC, Fiocruz. Graduated in Biological Sciences - Genetics major - from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (2006), with a Master's degree in Cell and Molecular Biology from the IOC (2008) and PhD in Biophysics from UFRJ (2012). Through high performance technologies for DNA sequencing and computational data analysis, I investigate the effects of pollution on fauna, using fish as model organisms, and their responses and genetic adaptations to pollutants, especially those involved in the xenobiotic biotransformation system.
Claire B Paris
Claire Beatrix Paris is a Professor in the department of Ocean Science, University of Miami’s Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science. Director of the Physical-Biological Interactions Lab, she focuses on biophysical dispersion at sea, as well as the transport and fate of pollutants and oil spills from deep-sea blowout. Paris has brought recognition to the key role of behavior of the pelagic larval stage in the connectivity of marine populations and the function of ecosystems.
Paris has developed numerical and empirical tools for her laboratory’s research, both used worldwide: the Connectivity Modeling System (CMS) is an Open-Source Software (OSS) that virtually tracks biotic and abiotic particles in the ocean, and the Drifting In Situ Chamber (DISC) is a field instrument used to track the movement behavior of the early life history stages of marine organisms and detect the signals they use to orient and navigate.
Marcio R Pie
Associate Professor of Zoology, Universidade Federal do Paraná, Brazil.
Xavier Pochon
Team Leader, Molecular Surveillance, Biosecurity Group, Cawthron Institute, New Zealand.
Associate Professor, Institute of Marine Science, University of Auckland, New Zealand.
My research at the Cawthron Institute is highly applied and consist of developing multi-trophic molecular tools for environmental monitoring of marine industries (e.g. aquaculture farms, marine biosecurity in ports and marinas, and deep-sea exploration).
At the University of Auckland, I combine 'real-world' and 'blue-sky' research applications, including; i) investigating functional underpinnings of Symbiodiniaceae in coral reef ecosystems, ii) characterizing microbiomes in aquaculture and natural settings, iii) measuring eDNA and eRNA decay rates in marine invertebrates and vertebrates, iv) studying preferential settlement of marine invasive species associated with marine plastic debris, and v) exploring the diversity and dynamics of open-ocean plankton communities in the Pacific and beyond.
Claudia Pogoreutz
My work broadly focuses on marine host-microbe systems, or ‘holobionts’, and the metabolic interactions that arise from and drive these complex symbiotic associations. I have always been interested in the microbial functions underlying holobiont health, resilience, and ecological adaptation, and how they shape holobiont stress responses. For this, I mainly use the cnidarian-algae symbiosis and associated bacteria as model systems, but have recently also started exploring the community structure, dynamics, and metabolic properties of fish skin microbiomes. My past and current research includes work on the contribution of nitrogen cycling pathways in cnidarian holobiont functioning and symbiotic breakdown, e.g., coral ‘bleaching’, as well as the elucidation of unknown functions of coral bacterial symbionts. For this, my approach has been to combine traditional physiological and culture-dependent techniques with high throughput-, next generation -omics applications, including whole genome and gene amplicon sequencing, transcriptomics, and proteomics. Currently, I am expanding my scope to targeted investigations of symbiotic metabolic interactions as a driver of osmoregulation in cnidarian holobionts employing nanoscale secondary ion mass spectrometry (NanoSIMS) along with isotopic profiling metabolomics.
Mason Posner
Professor and former Chairperson of Biology and Toxicology at Ashland University in Ohio. My research focuses on the evolution, physiology and biochemistry of alpha crystallins, a group of small heat shock proteins that protect cells against stress and are implicated in numerous diseases such as lens cataracts, Parkinsons, Alzheimers and cancer. My undergraduate research students and I use the zebrafish and other fish species as models to investigate alpha crystallin function. Our work involves qPCR to measure gene expression, CRISPR gene editing, proteomics, transcriptomics, promoter analysis and histology.
My background is in marine biology, systematics, ecology, molecular biology, protein biochemistry and comparative visual physiology. I train undergraduate research assistants in my laboratory and prepare students for graduate and professional schools and work in industry.
Alastair J Potts
I am interested in many aspects of South African œcology, including palaeovegetation distributions, plant phylogeography, drivers of biome boundaries and Albany Subtropical Thicket œcology (e.g. physiology, seed dispersal and restoration). I also spend time exploring the interface between phylogenetic trees and networks, as evolution is often poorly described using a bifurcating tree.