Home - Molecular Ecology Lab at Flinders University

We use information from genetics and genomics to address pure and applied research questions in population, conservation and evolutionary biology.
Our emphasis is on aquatic animals (particularly fishes, marine mammals and invertebrates) – but we also enjoy working with terrestrial organisms!
We do fieldwork in Australia and in other regions of the world including Amazonia, Patagonia, Gulf of California, southern Africa, Pampas, Cerrado, Galapagos, Indo-Pacific and Antarctica.

News

Genetic rescue is cover of Evolutionary Applications! 19 Jun 17. Our latest paper on genetic rescue is cover of Evolutionary Applications, one of the top journals in evolution (ranked 7th in the field)! This major and timely study of Macquarie perch is a collaboration with Paul Sunnuck's Lab at Monash University and with several government fisheries agencies. Title: "Severe consequences of habitat fragmentation on genetic diversity of an endangered Australian freshwater fish: A call for assisted gene flow" This paper is Open Access, access it here
Congratulations Fabricius for Doctoral Thesis Excellence! 11 Apr 17. Congratulations to MELFU's Fabricius Domingos for being awarded the Vice-Chancellor's Prize for Doctoral Thesis Excellence. This award recognises his outstanding academic performance in the course leading to the Doctor of Philosophy (PhD). Put it in another way, this is a badass PhD thesis about the evolution of lizards from Brazil's Cerrado. PARABÉNS FABRICIUS!!
SWINGER to the rescue of endangered species! 14 Nov 16. We have created SWINGER, the first computer software with an algorithm that uses information from DNA to match-make endangered animals for captive breeding. A quick look at the popularity of online dating services shows us that people are pretty comfortable with letting an algorithm choose them a mate. Now we want to do a similar thing for other animals. With human-driven extinctions on the rise, many species are likely to be left relying on captive breeding for their survival. We hope that our ...
Oceanography limits connectivity in southern Australia 4 Oct 16. Our paper about marine connectivity just published in Nature's Scientific Reports has important implications for the design of marine protected areas (MPAs), especially in South Australia. We jointly analysed oceanographic connectivity simulations and highly resolving genetic data and show that coastal currents – instead of promoting dispersal across vast regions as traditionally assumed – are actually promoting the retention of larvae close to parental habitats, even in high...
MELFU's first PhD thesis in landscape genomics 23 Sep 16. Congratulations Chris Brauer for finishing his PhD thesis! PhD #17 of the MELFU and the lab's first thesis on "population genomics". This work pioneers conservation genomics studies for southern hemisphere aquatic animals.Thesis title: "Conservation genomics and evolutionary potential of the southern pygmy perch, Nannoperca australis, in the Murray-Darling Basin, Australia"
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