Dr Chris Brauer

I am interested in the conservation, ecology and evolution of aquatic biodiversity. The effects of human development and recent climate change on our natural environment are pervasive and the threat these selective forces pose to global biodiversity is increasing. In my research I use genomics and transcriptomics to understand how populations and species evolve in response to their environment. I am particularly interested in understanding the relative contribution of plastic (environmental) and evolutionary (genetic) mechanisms in maintaining evolutionary potential of small populations. My PhD thesis explored these issues for southern pygmy perch (Nannoperca australis), a threatened freshwater fish from the Murray-Darling Basin, Australia. I am currently employed as a Postdoc at the Molecular Ecology Lab at Flinders University (MELFU) under the supervision of Prof Luciano Beheregaray where I am working on his ARC Future Fellowship project Ecological genomics of adaptation to environmental change.