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The following 10 projects are available for postgraduate students. If a student has ideas linked to these or are interested in other projects in the marine and coastal environment I encourage you to come and have a chat (in person, by email, skype, or phone). My research focuses on human impacts on the marine and coastal environment with an emphasis on biosecurity (introduced species) and conservation (including ecosystem restoration).
Project 1: Environmental generational amnesia: are we still connected to nature?
Supervisor: Professor Marnie Campbell m.campbell@cqu.edu.au
Background and Research Aims
Each generation sees their surrounding environment and benchmarks it as normal. But from generation to generation we have had environmental degradation, so what is pristine for my generation, for example, is degraded for generations before, or ‘pristine' for generations to come. Thus, newer generations ‘forget' what a pristine environment is because they haven't been exposed to one, which represents environmental generational amnesia (also referred to as extinction of experience or shifting baseline syndrome). This changing perception has many implications but one important aspect is how it affects conservation and natural resource sustainability. This can be explored by examining at our affinity with nature and seeing if there has been a change in our perceptions of nature between successive generations. Furthermore we can investigate whether people are willing, or less willing, to do something (e.g., make environmental improvements, stop utilising a resource) if their perception is that the environment/resource is in good condition (measured against their benchmark not successive generations). The fact that the condition is becoming worse each generation results in a loss of environmental values.
This project will investigate environmental generation amnesia and nature connectedness by comparing between generations (children, adults, retirees) and across different coastal environments (rural, industrial-rural, and urban). The aim of the project is to determine if environmental generational amnesia is occurring in Queensland and to develop strategies that will reconnect people, especially children, with nature.
Project 2: Value and risk mapping. Creating effective conservation and resource management tools.
Supervisors: Professor Marnie Campbell m.campbell@cqu.edu.au and Professor Chad Hewitt c.hewitt@cqu.edu.au
Background and Research Aims
This project will develop a management tool that can be used to help balance the competing needs of resource management and environmental imperatives. The project aims to identify, investigate, assess, and map the actual and perceived environmental, economic, social, and cultural values of the marine environment in one or more case study regions. These values can be collected using a combination of both market and non-market valuation techniques and the stakeholder consultation using social science methods of gathering perception data. The collected values information will feed into the development of risk maps for the Gladstone Harbour, Queensland. The resulting management tool will quantify and characterise marine ecosystem values to create a more holistic picture of the extent to which the marine environment benefits people and to define areas that are potentially at risk. The resulting GIS-based management tool will graphically display overlaying values to better inform decision-makers, especially within marine conservation and marine biosecurity contexts.
Project 3: Rafting of species on marine debris: do introduced species have a greater propensity to foul human generated debris?
Supervisor: Professor Marnie Campbell m.campbell@cqu.edu.au
Background and Research Aims
The dispersal of species and communities via the rafting has been well demonstrated, with numerous theories existing about whether rafts can act to connect isolated ‘islands'. Within a biosecurity context the concept of species dispersal is often categorised as human-mediated movement and natural movement of species. Rafting of species can fall into both of these categories, with natural substrates such as kelp wrack acting as natural dispersal methods, while human-made debris (e.g., plastics) can act as a human mediated transport mechanism. Introduced species have a propensity to colonise both human-made material and natural material, while native species tend not to colonise human-made materials.
This project will examine the species present on natural and human generated rafting material found on beaches and in mangals in the Gladstone region and surrounding islands. The aim of the project is to determine if introduced species are found in higher prevalence on human generated rafting material or natural marine debris; and if proximity to the port of Gladstone has an effect on introduced species prevalence of rafting species.
Project 4: Seagrass epiphytes as indicators of impact in the Gladstone and Fitzroy Basin region.
Supervisor: Professor Marnie Campbell m.campbell@cqu.edu.au
Background and Research Aims
Seagrasses are important primary producers in the marine ecosystem providing many ecosystem functions such as sediment stability and nutrient cycling, acting as a nursery for many juvenile crustacean and fish species, and providing food and protection for species. The biodiversity within seagrass meadows is often high as they offer both a complex habitat where species can burrow amongst their rhizomes and/or live as epiphytes/epibionts on their leaves. Seagrasses can occur in both subtidal and intertidal habitats and are particularly susceptible to human impacts such as eutrophication, dredging, and trampling and as such, are useful indicators of ecosystem stress or health. Eutrophication via excess nutrients is one of the most pervasive impacts on seagrasses. Excess nutrients are correlated with high seagrass epiphyte loads, which cause light attenuation and impacts upon seagrass morphometrics. Globally, seagrass epiphyte loads are commonly used as a tool to monitor excess nutrients in coastal waters. Because of the important marine ecosystem functions that seagrasses provide, they are protected in many States of Australia and in many countries. Although seagrasses are often protected, they tend to be ignored when terrestrial planning policy for coastal areas occurs.
The aim of this project is to examine the relationship between seagrasses and epiphytes within three locales close to Gladstone, and to parameterise the nutrient/epiphyte relationship. This will be done by: establishing baseline seagrass density and associated epiphyte biomass and abundance; determining the seagrass morphometrics at sampling locales; assessing the diversity and level of epiphyte fouling on seagrass species at the three locales; investigating if there is a link between known nutrient levels (eutrophication) in the sampling locales and epiphyte loads on seagrasses.
Project 6: Seagrass meadow resilience in the face of disturbance and species invasions.
Supervisor: Professor Marnie Campbell m.campbell@cqu.edu.au
Background and Research Aims
Seagrasses are important components of our coastal ecosystems. They provide a number of important functions and are recognized as habitats of significance. Yet, these habitats are exposed to disturbance (such as eutrophication, blowouts, and anchor damage) and disturbance is linked to introduced species invasions, which may synergistically increase the impacts to these habitats. The aim of this project is to examine if seagrass meadows are robust to introduced species invasions. This will be done by determining the presence/absence of introduced species in seagrass meadows that are exposed to a range of different disturbance scenarios and examining meadow health (seagrass morphometrics, seed bank characteristics). The amount of eutrophication and/or sedimentation (as a measure of ecosystem health) in these systems will also be measured noting the resultant impacts upon the seagrass morphometrics and epibionts to establish if there's a link between disturbance (eutrophication and/or sedimentation), seagrass impact and introduced species presence.
Project 7: Can restoration equivalency be achieved in coastal restoration efforts?
Supervisor: Professor Marnie Campbell m.campbell@cqu.edu.au
Background and Research Aims
One of the main tools that conservation ecologists/biologists and managers use to mitigate habitat destruction is the restoration of ecosystems or communities. Typically, ecosystem restoration is instigated to meet legislative obligations with the most common requirement being that the restored ecosystem must be equivalent to the ecosystem that was present prior to the impact that has caused the ecosystem's decline. This concept of restoring an ecosystem to a pre-determined, pre-impact state is referred to as "equivalency" and is often aspired to, but dogma and the literature suggests that it is rarely met. Equivalency can be broken down into two components: ecosystem composition (similar suites of species) and ecosystem function (intraspecific and interspecific interactions). Few restoration studies have occurred that assess whether equivalency has been achieved during a project and hence the efficacy of restoration efforts is rarely tested.
This project aims to assess the efficacy in coastal restoration efforts by examining restoration trajectories and asking the questions: how does a restored community develop and has equivalency been achieved? This will be done by determining similar coastal restoration efforts that have occurred for various durations; determining the objectives of these efforts; and assessing whether the goals of the restoration efforts have been met and thus determine if equivalency has occurred.
Project 8: The trade-offs between food security versus biosecurity in a global economy: are we compromising our biosecurity for food security?
Supervisor: Professor Marnie Campbell m.campbell@cqu.edu.au and Professor Chad Hewitt c.hewitt@cqu.edu.au
Background and Research Aims
Global food insecurity has been identified by the United Nations as a growing problem, particularly with most wild-capture fisheries deemed to be over-exploited. Access to basic nutritional requirements in many countries of the world has been used to justify significant investment by the The World Bank and other international aid/development agencies (eg Asian Development Bank, International Development Bank, UNDP, CIDA, DANIDA, GTZ, JICA/OECF, USAID, AUSAID, etc) in projects relating to new aquaculture endeavours in these regions. These projects are designed to facilitate both social (human nutrition, welfare) and economic (poverty alleviation, increase in economic activity) benefits. In many instances, these projects are based on the use of a standardized suite of aquaculture species that are themselves not native to the target regions.
The use of non-native species in these contexts poses a potential biosecurity threat, which may outweigh the social or economic benefits. This study will identify and evaluate aquaculture based development programs to determine the aims of the projects (e.g., poverty alleviation, food security, economic development), donor organization, the use of non-native species, the biosecurity management arrangements, the success of the project against stated outcomes, based on an evaluation of case studies derived from a suite of International and National Aid organizations and investigate if the public understands that food security may compromise biosecurity.
Project 9: Investigating behavioural intent and risk perception to develop introduced marine species vector and pathway models.
Supervisor: Professor Marnie Campbell m.campbell@cqu.edu.au
Background and Research Aims
The management of introduced species (biosecurity) is often involved with regulating intentional introductions of species. But what happens when unregulated introductions occur? How can unregulated and unintentional introductions be better managed? In some instances, unintentional introductions of species occur because people are ignorant that their actions are responsible for an introduction. For example, recent work has shown that some people may be aware of an invasive species but incorrectly self-assess that their actions are unrelated to the species movement between regions. In other instances, people are aware that their actions may cause a problem but choose to ignore this (risk takers). This project will focus on marine introductions and will investigate behavioural intent, risk perception and risk aversion of high risk marine user groups (ie fishers boaters, divers etc) that are vectors or might become vectors, of introduced species across international and domestic borders. This will be done by using social research skills to investigate perceptions and behavioural intent of targeted recreational and commercial users of the marine environment.
Project 10: Developing and test valid risk assessment models for marine biosecurity.
Supervisor: Professor Marnie Campbell m.campbell@cqu.edu.au and Professor Chad Hewitt c.hewitt@cqu.edu.au
Background and Research Aims
Risk assessment is a valuable tool used to assess the likelihood that an event may occur and the impacts that such an event may have. In the case of introduced species, risk assessment can be used to strengthen pre-border management (stopping introduced species crossing a border) and to help direct management in post-border (eradication or controlling an introduced species) situations. This project is open to interpretation by the student that wishes to pursue it. However, in essence the project will involve the development new risk assessment methodologies and investigation of different aspects of risk, such as uncertainty, the inclusions of social values, and balancing trade-offs. The risk assessment focus can be species, vector (transfer mechanism) or pathway (route of transfer) based, or a combination of these aspects. To date, researchers in my laboratory have looked at hub and spoke models for regions in Asia, assessed biofouling at an international scale, assessed travellers and recreational users as vectors, developed novel impact assessment methods, investigate the vectoring introduced species into marine protected areas, and are examining the risks associated with the aquarium trade.
PhD or Masters Opportunity: Assessing community preferences for an integrated regional waste management strategy using mining voids as a key disposal option
The transportation and treatment of municipal and industrial waste streams is emerging as a key issue in many regional communities. While much of the focus on waste management issues has been from technical and engineering disciplines, understanding the economics of waste management and the community acceptance of different management options is essential to developing options that the community will accept. The focus of this research will be to identify community preferences for different treatment, management and disposal options for waste, including options to incorporate waste into mine voids and mine rehabilitation management. Central Queensland will be used as the case study site.
Interested in applying? For more information on this project contact Susan Kinnear (s.kinnear@cqu.edu.au).
Details about available research higher degree scholarships can be found at www.research.cqu.edu.au (under ‘Future Research Candidates').
The SRD programme undertakes a wide variety of research aimed at helping to address the key challenges faced in the Central Queensland region. Student study projects are an excellent opportunity to expand our work, help service the needs and interests of our regional stakeholders, and to grow the skills and knowledge base in our programme.
The following topic areas could represent suitable projects for interns, honours or RHD students (depending on the level of detail). You are also more than welcome to contact any of our staff to discuss other areas of research that interest you.
Dr Susan Kinnear (please contact s.kinnear@cqu.edu.au):
Dr Galina Ivanova (please contact g.ivanova@cqu.edu.au):
Many environmental, social and economic decisions are made under uncertainty. While the several economic theories had been developed to address risk and uncertainty in the decision making process, there is evidence that people violate the assumptions of these theories. The project will utilise a review of literature to outline appropriate model(s) of decision-making under uncertainty with regards to environmental and social issues.
Energy efficiency and demand management are becoming increasingly important in meeting the challenges of an energy-constrained world. This project will investigate the ways by which household electricity demand can be reduced, through investigating the incentives for adoption of the energy efficient appliances.
The project will investigate community values for recycled water, price sensitivity of demand, values for risk reduction, support for various water policies and the tradeoffs that consumers are willing to make for various water quality, types of water (rainwater, recycled water) and time of supply.
Mr Lindsay Greer (please contact l.greer@cqu.edu.au):
Mr Delwar Akbar (please contact d.akbar@cqu.edu.au):
If you would like more information on other opportunities please email us at cem-enquiries@cqu.edu.au
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