DERI Seminar with Dr Gail Schofield
When: Thursday, May 26, 2022, 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Where: zoom
Speaker: Dr Gail Schofield, Lecturer in Aquatic Ecology at QMUL
Dr Gail Schofield will be presenting on Conserving elusive marine mega-fauna: monitoring, modelling and machine learning
Zoom Link: https://qmul-ac-uk.zoom.us/j/81148100921
Abstract:
For more than a century, the survival of large marine animals (rays and sharks, sea turtles, dolphins and whales) has been threatened by various human activities, with climate change and plastic pollution representing the most recent risks. Since the late 1980s, our understanding of the ecology (including climatic and habitat requirements) of these charismatic, yet elusive, animals has been continuously improving due to technological and computational advancements. This has allowed monitoring approaches to shift from the site to global scale, and from single species to multiple species; however, in parallel, this has generated the need to process, standardise and analyse huge volumes of data. In this talk, I will describe how my group (with exceptional collaborators) has combined photo-identification, remote tracking, aerial drones and social media with various mathematical tools to change how we perceive of large marine animals across various geographical scales, with a focus on sea turtles, and the implications on conservation management and policy.
Bio:
Gail Schofield is a biologist with broad experience working with different types of organisations to monitor and conserve threatened wildlife, including non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and national parks, as a consultant for environmental agencies and policy makers in the Mediterranean, and through conducting scientific research at UK, Greek, and Australian universities.
Her work primarily focuses on understanding the ecology of marine vertebrates to inform conservation actions at different scales. Gail's research involves investigating the behavioural, population and movement ecology of marine wildlife at different scales across time and space, and elucidating associations with oceanographic and environmental parameters, including the effects of climate change. She primarily uses sea turtles as her model species, due to their being ectotherms, with temperature affecting different life-history stages (from egg to adult) and strategies in various ways. In particular, she places strong emphasis on using her work to make practical suggestions to inform conservation management at local to regional scales, within and beyond protected areas, and along migratory corridors. Gail uses a range of approaches, including established emerging technologies (including high resolution GPS tracking units and drones), traditional approaches (direct observations and photo-identification) and cross disciplinary collaborations, for example with physical oceanographers, mathematicians and physicists to obtain novel insights on aspects of ecology that remain elusive, even today.
Information acquired through Gail's research has led to the amendment of national park precautionary maritime legislation to properly reflect in-water use of the largest sea turtle breeding area in the Mediterranean, in addition to the publication of a landmark study on the migration corridors of flatback sea turtles in relation to the recently established commonwealth marine reserve network in Australia. She has also contributed to and provided guidelines to the Quality Status Report (QSR) for the Mediterranean on Biodiversity ecological objectives and related common indicators of marine vertebrates for IMAP, UNEP and RAC SPA, using the Ecosystem Approach (EcAp) to achieve the Good Environmental Status (GES) in the Mediterranean.