Current Research
My interests lie in examining how changing environments influence the physiology of animals and the mechanisms animals have to deal with these changes. My PhD project will focus on the metabolic costs for frogs exposed to increases in temperature and UV, and how this will affect the strategies they use for dealing with variable environments.
Background
I graduated from The University of Sydney in 2009 with a Bachelor of Animal and Veterinary Bioscience Hons 1. For my honours project I researched the use of torpor in the fat-tailed dunnart (Sminthopsis crassicaudata) in response to restricted and variable diets. In between travelling in 2010 and 2011 I worked as a research assistant at The University of Sydney where I maintained a colony of marsupials and did follow on work from my honours project examining behavioural traits associated with restricted and variable diets in the fat-tailed dunnart.
Publications
Munn AJ, Kern P, McAllen BM. (2010). Coping with chaos: unpredictable food supplies intensify torpor use in an arid-zone marsupial, the fat-tailed dunnart (Sminthopsis crassicaudata). Naturwissenschaften 97:601–605.
Media and popular press
Irregular meals drive deep sleeps in the outback-New Scientist Online, November 2010
Coping with Chaos: torpor and food predictability in dunnarts - BBC Wildlife, July 2010
Conference proceedings
Kern, P, McAllan,B, Munn, A. (2010). Coping with chaos: unpredictable food supplies intensify torpor use in an arid-zone marsupial, the fat-tailed dunnart (Sminthopsis crassicaudata). In: 27th Meeting of the Australian New Zealand Society for Comparative Physiology and Biochemistry, The Australian National University (ANU), Canberra, ACT, Australia
Awards and Scholarships
2010 Australian Post Graduate Award
2009 Deans List of Excellence in Academic Performance
2008 Deans List of Excellence in Academic Performance
2007 Deans List of Excellence in Academic Performance
Academic Award for Academic Achievement
Contact Pippa