Overview

I am a NERC GW4+ PhD student in the College of Life and Environmental Science and the Exeter Marine research group.

My research aims to improve the efficacy of monitoring strategies that underpin marine protected areas (MPAs). This is particularly crucial in the context of the United Kingdom MPA network, where data availability often limits our understanding of effectiveness of MPAs at safeguarding marine biodiversity.

Through a collaborative partnership with the Inshore Fisheries and Conservation Authority and Natural England, my PhD currently focuses on developing resource-efficient survey methodologies to support a network of MPAs around the Isles of Scilly archipelago. By deploying baited underwater camera systems (BRUVS) we can assess diverse marine communities encompassing sharks, fish, and crustaceans within an array of habitats such as seagrass beds, kelp forests, and deepwater reefs. The data produced from these BRUVS surveys will provide a baseline of marine health for the region and help develop indicators for tracking MPA effectiveness into the future. We hope this work can act as blueprint for designing novel, cost-effect monitoring of inshore MPAs in the UK and coastal states more generally.

Qualifications

MSc Conservation Science and Policy (2017) – University of Exeter

BA Politics and International Relations (2011) – University of Nottingham

Career

2021 - present PhD Biological sciences (NERC GW4+ funded) - Assessing the ecological value of, and threats to marine protected areas in the Isles of Scilly (Univeristy of Exeter) 

2017 - 2021 Research Assistant - SEAWave, Shark catch and release survivability in recreational fisheries, Shining light on data poor fisheries in Myanmar, Atlantic bluefin tuna in the English Channel and Celtic Sea, English Marine Spatial Planning and the Ocean Health Index, Autonomous underwater videography and tracking of basking sharks (Univeristy of Exeter)

2016 - 2017 MSc Conservation Science and Policy (Univeristy of Exeter)

2008 - 2011 BA Politics and International Relations

Research group links

• Marine Ecology

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Research

Research interests

Marine spatial ecology

Fisheries management

Remote sensing

Biologging 

Research projects

2020 – 2021 Shark catch and release survivability in recreational fisheries - https://www.sharks.sustainable-seas.org/ 

• Development and application of electronic survivorship tags to understand the factors impacting the post-release survival and behavior of recreationally caught sharks in UK waters.

2019 - 2021 Shining light on data poor fisheries, Myanmar - https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmars.2020.625766/full 

• Using remotely sensed, earth observation data to model fishing vessel distribution and spatial biomass extraction in data poor regions. 

2018 – 2021 Atlantic bluefin tuna in the English Channel and Celtic Sea - https://www.thunnusuk.org/  

• Deployment and interrogation of data from archival and accelerometer tags to examine annual migration and fine-scale behavior of recreationally caught Atlantic bluefin tuna (Thunnus thynnus).

2018 – 2020 English Marine Spatial Planning and the Ocean Health Index - https://www.ohi.sustainable-seas.org/ 

• GIS and data technician synthesizing large, often disparate, socioeconomic and environmental data sets into a composite indicator index to inform marine monitoring across South West England.

2017 - 2019 Autonomous underwater videography and tracking of basking sharks - https://www.nature.scot/plants-animals-and-fungi/fish/sea-fish/basking-shark 

• At sea deployment of towed camera tags, AUV and telemetry tags to observe subsurface behaviour of sharks (Cetorhinus maximus) within a proposed MPA, Scotland. 

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