The MegaMove team was 'on the move' to meet in Canberra!

2-March-2023 (written by Xiaohan Xu)

The MegaMove team, led by Dr. Ana Sequeira (ANU Research School of Biology), met in Canberra last week to advance ongoing research, discuss new plans, and start new collaborations!

The meeting brought together the MegaMove Steering Committee and Operational Team members with a focus on assessing the state- of-the-art of marine megafauna science and on the imminent needs to address conservation of these highly charismatic species. The MegaMove team headed to the ANU Kioloa campus for a retreat first, and then had an additional couple of days at the ANU campus in Canberra with an extended group of scientists. Invitations were extended to include Prof. Anthony Richardson and Dr. Karen Evans from CSIRO, as well as Dr. Luca Giuggioli from University of Bristol, all bringing complementary expertise to the group.

As part of this meeting, Ana also hosted an open workshop for staff and students from The Australian National University (ANU), University of Canberra (UC) and CSIRO, focusing on marine megafauna and on some of the grand challenges associated with the conservation of the global ocean and marine ecosystems. This event was supported by a Synthesis Grant awarded by the Centre for Biodiversity Analyses and included a set of presentations from the meeting participants that focused on marine megafauna in the context of global initiatives, existing threats and new analytical methods. You can see a summary of the presentations here!

Stay tuned for news on the outcome of this meeting!