UQ dugong researcher Elizabeth Burgess has been awarded a Queensland-Smithsonian Fellowship 2010.
The award will allow Ms Burgess to travel to the USA in August this year to conduct collaborative endocrine research with Dr Janine Brown at the Conservation Research Centre, Smithsonian National Zoo, Virginia.
It will provide an opportunity to complete her reproductive endocrine studies of the vulnerable dugong at one of the world’s largest and most productive wildlife endocrinology laboratories.
“Dr Brown is a world-authority on elephant reproduction and hormones, so this opportunity provides the chance for me to compare endocrine function in the dugong with that of its closest terrestrial relative,” said Ms Burgess, of UQ's School of Biological Sciences.
Her PhD research is focused on determining critical life history parameters of the dugong in southern Queensland.
“Along this urban coast, there appears to have been a 95 percent decline in dugong populations over the past 50 years," she said.
"These declines have highlighted the need for reliable regional information concerning life history parameters for this species, including survivorship and reproductive rates,” she said.
Dr Janet Lanyon, who is a world expert on dugong research based at UQ, said management strategies for dugongs throughout their range had incorporated life history parameters obtained from analysis of dead dugongs from tropical regions.
"It is inappropriate to apply these life history parameters to subtropical, free-ranging dugong populations where seasonality is more pronounced, and growth and reproductive rates may be lower,” she said.
Unlike earlier studies, Ms Burgess's research has taken a hands-on approach to studying dugongs.
“Endocrine studies have been conducted on live free-ranging dugongs to develop a pregnancy test, determine body size at maturity, and to examine seasonality of reproductive activity in both males and females.
"The life history parameters derived from this study will be used to determine growth rates, age at first reproduction, and recruitment rates, all parameters that are essential for studies of population viability and dynamics,” said Ms Burgess.
While she is working with Queensland populations, the methods she is developing will be applicable to dugongs throughout their Indo-Pacific range.
Her research is being supervised by Dr Janet Lanyon and Professor Hugh Possingham, and has received financial support from the Australian Marine Mammal Centre, Winifred Scott Foundation and Sea World Research and Rescue Foundation.
Media: Tracey Franchi, Communications Manager School of Biological Sciences (3365 4831, t.franchi@uq.edu.au).
