BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DEPARTMENT MATTERS | August 18, 2017

Dear all,

A huge week for the department with many of our staff and students participating in Science Week at the Australian Museum and elsewhere, preparations for Open Day (tomorrow!) and Jemma Geoghegan winning the Tall Poppy award! Thanks to everyone who has contributed so far (especially organisers Matthew Bulbert and Ajay Narendra) and I”m looking forward to a great day showcasing Biology @MQ tomorrow.

cheers,

Michelle

Save the Date

This coming week  21st – 25th August

Wed 23rd: Leanne Armand’s Farewell Morning Tea; 10:30am – 11:30am; E8A-280 (Biology Tea Room).

Wed 23rd: Department seminar – Professor Chris Johnson, The University of Tasmania; 1pm – 2pm; E8A-280 (Biology Tea Room).

Thu 24th: Launch of Dick Frankham’s latest book ‘Genetic management of fragmented animal and plant populations’; 10:30am – 12:00pm; E8A-280 (Biology Tea Room).

Thu 24th: Writing Workshop; 2:30-4:30pm, E8A-280 (Biology Tea Room).

Following week 28th August – 1st September

Tue 29th: R-Users Group; 3:00pm – 5:00pm; E8A-280 (Biology Tea Room).

Wed 30th: Department Morning Tea; 10:30am – 11:30am; The Hill.

Wed 30th: Department seminar – Professor Michael Gillings, MQ; 1pm – 2pm; E8A-280 (Biology Tea Room).

Thu 31st: Writing Workshop; 2:30-4:30pm, E8A-280 (Biology Tea Room).

Fri 1st Sep: HDR Cafe; 12:00pm – 1:00pm; C5C 209 (RSVP req)

Coming up

Every Thursday for the next few months: Writing Workshop; 2:30-4:00pm; E8A-280 (Biology Tea Room).

Sept 19th: ECR Showcase; E8A-280 (Biology Tea Room).

Sept 27th: MQ Graduation ceremony for Biological Sciences (Academic staff register here)

Oct 2nd: Special Seminar: A/Prof Maren Wellenreuther “Women in Science: Highlighting the changing face of evolutionary biology”; 1 – 2pm; C8A 310 Senate Room.

Nov 13-14: Department Retreat for Academic Staff; venue TBC.

Dec 5th: Formal Department meeting for grading, followed by the Christmas Party

Department seminar schedule
September 13th: Dr Caragh Threlfall, The University of Melbourne
September 20th: Dr Kate Lynch, MQ Departmental ECR
October 4th: Dr Lesley Lancaster, University of Aberdeen
October 11th: Dr John Martin, Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney
October 18th: Associate Professor Matthew England, The University of NSW
October 25th: Associate Professor Carla Sgro, Monash University
November 1st: Dr Ajay Narendra, Macquarie University
November 8th: Associate Professor Bob Wong, Monash University
November 15th: Associate Professor Nathan Lo, The University of Sydney

General News and Announcements

New Addition to the Biology Family!

Paulo Manuel Tozer: Born 1:32pm on the 6th Aug 2017.   3.695kg, 52cm tall.

Paulo was keen to get out, so it was a quick birth. Epidurals can go wrong and we fell into that unlucky category of epidural complications (damned statistics!). As a consequence mum’s recovery was slow, but all is well now and everyone is home and remembering what its like to have a newborn in the house. Santiago and Antonio are very happy to have a little brother!

Huge Congratulations to Our Newest Tall Poppy – Jemma Geoghegan!

Jemma was awarded the Young Tall Poppy Science Award, announced today as part of the Sydney Science Festival. This award recognises outstanding young researchers and communicators across science, engineering and mathematics. For the next year she will be honing her communication skills on school students, teachers and the broader community through workshops, seminars and public lectures. Well done!

Read more: http://www.mq.edu.au/newsroom/2017/08/17/macquarie-grows-our-tall-poppies-well-evolutionary-biologist-dr-jemma-geoghegan-awarded/#ixzz4q147tK6V

Biological Sciences at Open day

DEPARTMENTAL SEMINAR SERIES

Day/Date/Time/Place: Wednesday, 23rd August, 1-2pm, E8A-280 (Tea Room).

Speaker: Professor Chris Johnson, The University of Tasmania.

Title: Rewilding for management of threatened and invasive species in novel ecosystems

Abstract: Modern ecosystems are increasingly composed of novel mixtures of indigenous and exotic species, with unstable dynamics, low resilience, and high rates of threat of extinction of native species. One of the root causes of this modern condition is loss of top-down control of ecosystem dynamics, which was once imposed by large vertebrates that have been disappearing since the Pleistocene. The loss of these animals not only shifted ecosystems to new states, but also created opportunities for later invasions by exotic species, some of which triggered further extinction cascades. To some extent these problems can be remedied by reintroductions of large-bodied species analogous to lost megafauna: this is rewilding in its classic sense. But often, megafaunal analogues are either unavailable or unlikely to be socially accepted as introduced species. In such cases, how can we accomplish rewilding, in the broader sense of using strongly-interacting species to sustain trophic and species diversity without direct and repeated interventions by managers to remove invasive species or protect threatened natives? This problem is especially well exemplified by the southern land-masses of Australia and New Zealand. Both places are much-invaded by ecologically destructive species such as feral cats and European rabbits, and have suffered exceptionally high rates of extinction of endemic animals over the last two centuries. I will review this contemporary problem in light of Pleistocene extinctions of megafauna. I will then consider what options are available to ecosystem managers to rewild these ecosystems in the broad sense described above. These include recognising the ecological value of exotic species such as dingoes and camels, managing habitat structure using fire to reduce impacts of invasive predators such as feral cats, using livestock guardian dogs as surrogate top predators, and others.

Do You Feel Stressed, Stretched or that Your Life Needs More Balance?

Academics and HDR students work hard and can sometimes feel a bit overwhelmed with their work. Did you know that the University’s Employee Assistance Program (EAP) is available for all MQ staff 24/7? It is a confidential counselling, coaching and wellbeing service that can help you achieve lifestyle, work, personal and family goals and assist you with managing work and life experiences, issues or concerns that arise from time to time. Information about this program can be found here.

Students have available Campus Wellbeing that offers a range of wellbeing services that are available at any time during your studies – you can find more information here.

As well, MQ’s Wellbeing Week is just around the corner on 7-14 September, featuring informative lunchtime sessions, campus walks, exercise classes, healthy cooking demonstrations, art classes and FREE access at the Sports and Aquatic Centre for staff all week. Find out more here

Gender Equity Summit Invitation

The university would like to invite all those who are working for gender equality and inclusion at Macquarie to our first Gender Equity Summit. This event will provide an opportunity for you to hear about our progress so far on implementing the strategy and to meet one another, share ideas and successes, and find opportunities for collaboration. We would also like to hear how we can better support you, and provide some information and guidance (e.g. ‘top quick wins for gender equity and inclusion’).

The event will be on Wednesday 20th September, from 2pm – 4pm in E7A 801. Afternoon tea will be provided.

Diversity & Inclusion in Biology

The Departmental Diversity and Inclusion Group says ‘YES’ to Marriage equality and encourages all staff and students to enrol to vote by August 24: http://aec.gov.au/enrol/

Many of our LBGTI staff and students will experience the national debate as particularly stressful, and we encourage everyone to handle discussions with respect. Help and support is available here: https://students.mq.edu.au/support/wellbeing

Attention All HDR Candidates

SAVE THE DATE! We are delighted to invite you to our next HDR Café on Friday, 1 September! 

HDR Café is a space for the HDR students to share their highs and lows of the research journey, and to create research networks among peers.

This semester’s HDR Café’s theme is around how to pitch your research effectively. The 3MT is coming up, a great opportunity for us to share our experiences of pitching our research. The special guests Sijia Chen (2016 MQ 3MT winner and National Finalist) and Uchechukwu Ngwaba (2015 MQ 3MT 2nd winner) will attend the event.

Come and join us for a peer-to-peer event, where you will find a bunch of people with similar thoughts and experiences.

Date: Friday, September 1st
Time: 12pm-1pm
Venue: C5C 209

To join the café RSVP here. You are also welcome to visit  HDR Mentors Official Webpage  and follow us  on Facebook and Twitter  page to learn more about HDR Mentors activites and upcoming events!

Did You Participate in an Outreach Activity Recently for the Department? (and we know you did during Science Week!)

Don’t for get to fill in the super-quick form here – – ACCESS OUTREACH FORM HERE

2pm – 4.30pm session for MATH/STATS/PHYS/ASTR/ENGG/IT/IS researchers

Cycling Sydney to the ‘Gong 2017 to Fight MS

Nick Harris, Tarun Rajan, and Timothy Maher are participating in this year’s Sydney to the Gong ride to raise awareness and funds for Multiple Sclerosis research.  Please see attached flyer for more.

NH TM TR Syd2Gong for MS

Donate Sanitary Items During August to Share the Dignity

Due to homelessness, poverty or escaping domestic violence, women in crisis do not have access to the sanitary items they need. For the month of August, you can Share the Dignity by dropping the items off at Level 1, Building E8C Room 153. Contact Leigh Staas for more information.

Climate Change

There is a new CSIRO study about climate change in Australia. They are looking for participants and here is the link: https://research.csiro.au/biodiversity-knowledge/projects/recent-history-climate-driven-ecological-change-australia/

Mabberley’s Latest Edition of the Plant Book is Now Available
The fourth edition of David Mabberley’s epic bible on all things plant – the Plant-Book – has now been published – the link to the website is here www.cambridge.org/9781107115026

Of Further Interest to Plant Scientists

At the International Botanical Congress (Shenzhen, China) a couple of weeks ago the Shenzhen Forum released the Shenzhen Declaration on Plant Sciences: Uniting plant sciences and society to build a green, sustainable Earth. http://www.ibc2017.cn/load/?filename=/attached/SZdeclaration.pdf

Plant of the Week

For this week, Camellia reticulata   –  滇山茶 – Yunnan Mountain Tea.

Worldwide, there are about 120 species of Camellia;  97 species occur in China and of these, 76 are endemic. Camellia reticulata grows in montane forests of south-western China where it has long been cultivated both for the oil extracted from its seeds and as an ornamental plant.

Additions to the Department News

You may have noticed that we try to keep all the articles to the same format for the Department Matters, however, rest assured, they do NOT all turn up in this format!  To help keep your Department Matters looking as good as possible, when sending in additions to the Newsletter, please try to keep these formatting guidelines in mind.

1. Please write in third person. The information is coming from the Newsletter, not directly from you.
2. Do not use fancy text formatting.  Bold heading, normal text, and only italics or bold to highlight.  No font size changes will make it through, sorry.
3. If sending via email, set your email output to basic.  HTML output will add all sort of formatting that will have to be removed before your article can go into the newsletter.

Keeping to these guidelines will streamline your article’s addition to the newsletter.  Thank you.

XIX International Botanical Congress, Shenzhen, China, July 23-29, 2017

Macquarie University’s Department of Biological Sciences was well represented at the XIX International Botanical Congress held in Shenzhen in south-eastern China from 23-29 July this year. Following is a report in PDF of the highlights, and some images for you to enjoy.  More next week!

XIX International Botanical Congress report

Summer Vacation Scholarship Opportunities for Undergraduate University Students at CSIRO

CSIRO have 11 paid opportunities available in a wide range of areas including genomics, taxonomy and science communication.

The detailed descriptions of the Summer Vacation Scholarship opportunities for undergraduate university students are now live on the CSIRO career portal.
https://jobs.csiro.au/job/Various-CSIRO-Undergraduate-Vacation-Scholarships-National-Research-Collections-Australia-%28NRCA%29/416889300/

Please announce these paid undergraduate internships to your students and wider networks.

HDR workshop – Discourse Analysis for the Social Sciences (AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES)

Tuesday 22 August 2017

The use of language in society can be an important source of data and evidence in many fields of the social sciences. Many researchers in the social sciences already work with language data, either created in the research process (e.g. interviews), or sourced from natural contexts of interaction, such as media discourse (including social media), clinical consultations, political speeches, texts in law, pedagogic discourse, advertising, literature etc. This workshop will introduce some basic techniques on the use of language data in the social sciences, drawing on the growing field of “corpus linguistics”. We will look at some large publically accessible corpora (e.g. the Google Books Corpus, the Brigham Young Corpora, the British National Corpus). We will discuss the kinds of questions that can be asked of this easily accessible data. We will also review some publically available tools for basic discourse analysis, which enable us to search word frequencies and collocational patterns. Some essential concepts from linguistics – how words mean, how texts are embedded in social and cultural contexts, how linguistic form construes meaning – will be introduced to consider the enormous potential as well as the limitations of language as evidence in the social sciences.

*Please bring your own laptop to this workshop as you will be downloading free software and setting it up on your computer.

Click here [ https://hdrworkshops.mq.edu.au/registration/new/14541?year=2017 ] to register for ‘Discourse analysis for the social sciences (AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES)’

REP Masterclass: Developmental Plasticity and Evolution

Wednesday 20th September (9:00 – 13:00 with short breaks).

Organised by David Wells, this offering will include substantial opportunity for discussion. Everyone very welcome to attend.

The Modern Synthesis has been the dominant paradigm in evolutionary biology since the 1930s and 1940s, but proposals to modify it, typically by extending it in various ways, have recently become more insistent. This workshop will examine the proposed Extended Evolutionary Synthesis by examining the work of one specific proponent, Mary Jane West-Eberhard, whose book, Developmental Plasticity and Evolution, arguably represents the most comprehensive attempt at synthesis. The work of others will be discussed as appropriate. Evolution by natural selection has three pre-requisites: variation, selection and inheritance. WestEberhard does not disagree with this, but argues that it needs to be seen in the context of development understood as all phenotypic change during the lifetimes of individual organisms or higher units of organization. For example, she argues that some of what appears to be evolution by natural selection is actually the rearrangement of pre-existing developmental modules, with little or no genetic change. Where there is genetic change, it is genetic accommodation to the changes occurring in the phenotype. In general, West-Eberhard treats genes as ‘followers rather than leaders’ in evolution. How strong is the empirical evidence for this view, and does her synthesis hang together? WestEberhard’s focus is on the arrangement of components in a system, not on the action of any one component, specifically the gene. Particular attention will be paid to her liberal use of the concept of ‘emergence’, understood as a macro-level phenomenon such as evolutionary novelty arising from micro-level phenomena, while nevertheless having autonomy from the micro-level base on which it depends. There will be substantial opportunity for discussion.

Click here to register for ‘Developmental Plasticity and Evolution’

REP Masterclass: Making Your Science Matter: Linking Science with Action to Improve the World

Two-hour workshop running on Tuesday, October 24th (2-4 pm)

Instructors:
Dr. Elizabeth Madin, Macquarie University
Dr. Emily Darling, Wildlife Conservation Society
Dr. Marah Hardt, Future of Fish
Prof. Lesley Hughes, Macquarie University

Co-badged with MQU Marine Research Centre

We all want to feel like our research matters…but it is sometimes hard to know how to make it relevant to people and institutions beyond academia. How can we best make our science understood, appreciated, and perhaps even acted upon by policy-makers? These are the kinds of questions we will delve into. Inspired by the book “Escape from the Ivory Tower” by Nancy Baron, this short course will help you improve your ability to design and communicate your science to benefit the world at large.

Participant numbers will be capped (first-in secures a place).

Click here to register for ‘Making your science matter: Linking science with action to improve the world’

Fancy a Trip to the Desert? 

A short-term volunteer is being sought to drive out to Fowlers Gap (near Broken Hill), on around the 25th August, and then stay out at this amazing field station for up to two weeks to assist a PhD student Caterina Funghi get her fieldwork started. This is an excellent opportunity to go and discover a bit of arid Australia and iconic wildlife such as red kangaroos, and zebra finches. All accommodation costs will be covered for the duration of the trip. Check out the field station  website if you need any encouragement……..  https://www.fowlersgap.unsw.edu.au/

You will need a valid drivers licence. Please contact Caterina directly to express interest.

<caterina.funghi@students.mq.edu.au>

New Publications

In the Media

Recent Completions

Samuel Andrew submitted his PhD thesis entitled “Exploring adaptation in the introduced house sparrow to Australian climates and environments.”

Supervised by Professor Simon Griffith

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