Summary of the project
Understanding animal movement is especially important for highly migratory species, internationally threatened or vulnerable, such as humpback whales, loggerhead turtles and whale sharks. Advancing current knowledge of marine megafauna movement patterns and ecology on which to base environmental laws for protection is imperative to minimise impacts from anthropogenic activities.
We have just commenced an exciting ARC DECRA project ‘Movement patterns of marine megafauna movement at unprecedented global scales’ and the PhD project will be integrant part of the larger DECRA project.
The main objective is to significantly advance global knowledge in the field of movement ecology with two main overarching goals:
- to understand how anthropogenic activities may be affecting the movement of marine megafauna species and
- to understand how movement data can be used in support of conservation and management.
The PhD applicant will be analysing global environmental datasets and developing statistical models to predict occurrence of marine megafauna and potential impacts from expected changes (e.g. global warming). Due to data scarcity in some areas around the globe, the candidate will also test the transferability of the models developed while predicting to new locations where data are currently missing.
Complete announcement:Â http://www.science.uwa.edu.au/future-students/postgrad/opportunities/biological/marine-megafauna/_nocache?platform=hootsuite
Source: Marine Biologist network