Dr Maria Beger

Profile

My Academic Background

• 2016-2020 University Academic Fellow, University of Leeds
• 2012-2016 Research Fellow, ARC Centre of Excellence for Environmental Decisions, The University of Queensland, Australia
• 2008-2011 Postdocs: The University of Queensland, University of Melbourne, University of Tasmania
• 2002-2008 PhD Conservation Science, The University of Queensland, Australia
• 2000-2002 Australian-European Exchange Scholar, James Cook University, Australia
• 1996 Dipl.Ing. Groundwater Engineering, TU Dresden, Germany
• 1994 MSc Marine Resources Management & Conservation, Heriot Watt Uni, UK

My Science:

I am a conservation ecologist with complementary interests in coral reef ecology and spatial conservation prioritization. I mostly work in the Coral Triangle, the Pacific, the Western Indian Ocean, Japan and Australia.  I also work in projects dealing with fish biomass predictions, climate change science, ecosystem services, and global evaluations of protected areas. Current themes I work on are:

•     Integrating larval dispersal into spatial planning and conservation;
•     How can genetic data inform conservation decisions?
•     Managing whole life cycles in migratory animals: integrating telemetry into planning;
•     How can we model and manage coral reef resilience?
•     Multi-taxon community assembly rules along a tropical to temperate temperature gradient (Australia, Japan)
•     Managing range shifts;
•     How do pristine reefs differ (Republic of the Marshall Islands)?
•     Develop coastal and offshore bioregionalisations (South Pacific);
•     Quantifying human-ecological links in coastal ecosystems;
•     Which fish are here (fish species counts in Japan, Maldives, Philippines, Indonesia, PNG, Australia, Palau, FSM, Marshall Islands, ...)?

I collaborate with local and regional conservation NGOs, including The Nature Conservancy (Coral Triangle, Micronesia), IUCN (Pacific, Maldives), World Wildlife Fund (Malaysia), Marshall Islands Conservation Society (Republic of the Marshall Islands). I also work with government agencies, such as the NSW Department of Primary Industries and NSW Office of Environment and Heritage in Australia.

Research interests

I am a quantitative marine ecologist and conservation scientist integrating field data, spatial models and decision science to find conservation solutions that link theory and practice. 

• Life History & genetic strategies of corals in marginal systems
• Protection and Restoration of mangroves improve biodiversity and livelihoods
• Understanding and managing marine transformations on subtropical reefs

Student education

Please contact me to discuss potential PhD  projects in the fields of:

• Marine ecology
• Spatial conservation planning
• Climate change ecology

See also:

• Faculty Graduate School

Current postgraduate researchers

• Morven Rae-Seaman

Projects

<li><a href="//phd.leeds.ac.uk/project/1669-assessing-demographic-resilience-of-tropical-and-temperate-reef-organisms">Assessing demographic resilience of tropical and temperate reef organisms</a></li>