Program

Dr. Christine Dudgeon is a Senior Research Fellow at the University of the Sunshine Coast and the University of Queensland, and a recognised world expert in elasmobranch biology. She earned her PhD in Marine Science from the University of Queensland in 2009 studying the ecology of the Indo-Pacific leopard shark.  Chris' research interests include the origin and maintenance of biodiversity, particularly in marine systems, and the implications for wildlife management. She employs a suite of techniques working across genetics, telemetry, natural and conventional tagging and statistical modelling to address fundamental and applied research questions.  She works closely with various renowned scientific programs, including ReShark and Project Manta, and serves as the regional co-Vice Chair for the Oceania IUCN SSC Shark Specialist Group.

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Chris has been part of OCS since 2005 and is one of the founding members.

Professor Colin Simpfendorfer has been a shark researcher since 1986. He has a PhD from James Cook University. He has worked as a research scientist at the Western Australian Fisheries Department and Mote Marine Laboratory, and as an academic at James Cook University and University of Tasmania. His research focuses on science to inform the conservation and management of sharks and rays. He is an author on more than 300 peer-reviewed scientific papers on life history, movement ecology, acoustic telemetry methods, fisheries status, population status, and much more. He was Co-Chair of the IUCN Shark Specialist Group from 2012 to 2020; and has served on Australia’s national Threatened Species Scientific Committee since 2015. Since 2019 he has been based in Hobart and works on a range of shark and ray conservation initiatives both in Australia and internationally.

Colin has been a member of OCS since 2007 and was a keynote speaker at the first conference held in Queenscliff in 2007. 

Dr. Adam Barnett is the Principal Scientist, Manager and Chair of the Biopixel Oceans Foundation Science Committee. Adam is a field biologist with over 20 years’ experience in marine research. In this era of modelling and ever-increasing tightening of OH&S regulations, the field biologist can feel like a threatened species. With a broad interest in ecology, an interesting question on any taxa will catch his attention. However, of particular interest is predator-prey interactions and unravelling the role of predators in structuring ecosystems. Adam has raised >AUD$12 million in funding and published 100 scientific papers. Projects in recent years include leading government-funded projects investigating shark prevalence and behaviour in relation to human activities, co-managing the largest acoustic array ever deployed in Queensland (with >340 receivers deployed and >1000 animals tagged in the past three years), and leading a team of experts from around the world to discover the first whale shark and Omura’s whale aggregations on the east coast of Australia. 

Adam joined OCS in 2006 for the inaugural year of the society.