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Paul Dennis leads an exciting research group that applies cutting-edge technologies to understand the roles of microorganisms and their responses to environmental change.

He is also a passionate educator and public speaker who advocates for the importance of biological diversity and evidence-based environmental awareness. He has talked about his research on ABC Radio and a range of other media outlets.

His teaching covers aspects of ecology, microbiology, plant and soil science, and climatology. He considers these topics to be of fundamental importance for the development of more sustainable societies and takes pride in helping others to obtain the knowledge and skills they need to build a better future.

Paul's research has taken him to Antarctica, the Amazon Rainforest, high mountains and oceans. The approaches used in his lab draw on a wide range of expertise in molecular biology, ecology, statistics, computer science, advanced imaging and soil science. He applies these skills to a wide-range of topics and systems including plant-microbe interactions, Antarctic marine and terrestrial ecology, biogeography, pollution and human health.

Dr Mansour Edraki is a geo-environmental scientist specialising in the field of inorganic geochemistry. He joined UQ following completion of his PhD at the University of New England. Prior to that, and before immigrating to Australia, he was a lecturer in earth sciences. Since joining UQ, Dr Edraki has focused on developing innovative techniques for understanding and predicting geochemical processes that underpin sustainable management of mine waste and mine water, particularly acid and metalliferous drainage. Mansour’s research has direct applications for the resources and energy industries and the impact of his work is evident in a continuous flow of industry-funded projects in the last decade. Dr Edraki has initiated research collaborations in many international locations including Indonesia (South Kalimantan and Freeport), Iran (Mehdiabad Zinc) Papua New Guinea (Ok Tedi), Philippines (USEP and Mindanao Development Authority), Korea (MIRECO and KIGAM), Peru (INGEMET), and Chile (Fundación Chile, Universidad de Concepción). Dr Edraki represents SMI-UQ at the International Network for Acid Prevention (INAP), which is a global alliance for managing the issue of acid and metalliferous drainage. He leads SMI's Environmental Geochemistry Group.

Valerie’s research focusses on coastal ecosystem conservation and restoration. She holds an AXA-UNESCO research fellowship on mangrove community forestry for resilient coastal livelihoods, endorsed as an action of the UN Ocean Decade. She co-leads a National Environmental Science Program (NESP) project on carbon abatement and biodiversity enhancements from controlling feral ungulates in wetlands in Australia and is developing a framework to measure verified biodiversity benefits in coastal wetland restoration projects in partnership with CSIRO. She recently led a NESP project on coastal wetland restoration opportunities in Australia for blue carbon and co-benefits for biodiversity, fisheries, water quality, and coastal protection and an Australian Research Council linkage project to identify social and ecological conditions that enable effective mangrove conservation over global and regional scales with partners at The Nature Conservancy and Healthy Land and Water. She has published research on the drivers of global mangrove losses and gains and coastal wetland restoration opportunities. She has co-authored international guidelines on mangrove restoration with Conservation International and incorporation of coastal wetlands into national greenhouse gas inventories with the Australian Government International Blue Carbon Partnerships. Valerie is an experienced ecologist and is a board member of the Society of Ecological Restoration Australasia and a representative of Australia’s Restoration Decade Alliance.

Nature-based rehabilitation science and technology, with a focus on ecological engineering of mine wastes (e.g., AMD-waste rocks, tailings (coal tailings, magnetite tailings, bauxite residues (or red mud), Cu/Pb-Zn tailings)) into earth materials (e.g., soil, engineered rocks) and resilient landforms for cost-effective sustainable rehabilitation at mine waste landscapes.

Professor Huang is a full professor and the group leader of Ecological Engineering in Mining, in the Sustainable Minerals Institute, University of Queensland. Since 2010, Prof Huang has pioneered new concepts and technological framework to manage and rehabilitate mine wastes (e.g., tailings, acidic and metalliferous waste rocks), through putting pedogenesis in engineering nutshell, i.e., eco-engineering of pedogenesis in mine wastes. He is leading an industry-enaged and interdisciplinary research group that is partnered with leading mining companies and empowered by multidisciplinary knowledge and skills on: environmental molecular microbiology, environmental mineralogy, soil science, native plant rhizosphere (micro)biology, soil-plant relations, and bio-chemical engineering of environmental materials (e.g., functional carbon and mineral absorbents, environmental geopolymers).

He is highly experienced in industry-partnered research and translation of knowledge into field-based technologies for tackling large environmental challenges in the mining industry, for example, technologies for tackling global tailings problem. Since 2010, he has led many large and industry-partnered research projects attracting about $21M funding. The research aims to deliver transformative knowledge and practices (i.e., technologies/methdologies) in the rehabilitation of mine wastes (e.g., tailings, mineral residues, spoils, waste rocks) and mined landscapes for non-polluting and ecologically and financially sustainable outcomes. Prof Huang has successfully demonstrated innovative methodology and technology to achieve nature-based outcomes in treating and rehabilitating tailings and waste rocks. Prof Huang’s research program was featured in Rio Tinto’s media releases as one of the four most successful global R&D partnerships in 2024. Prof Huang led the development of the first field-feasible technology to treat and dealkalize alkaline bauxite residues for sustainable rehabilitation. His industry-partnered research was recognised in 2019 UQ’s Partners in Research Excellence Award (Resilient Environments) (Rio Tinto and QAL). Prof Huang is also developing new knowledge and technologies for achieving non-polluting and ecologically sustainable rehabilitation of, for example, coal mine spoils and tailings, Fe-ore tailings, bauxite tailings (from mining bauxite), and Cu/Pb-Zn tailings.

Membership of Board, Committee and Society

Professional associations and societies

2010 – Present Australian Soil Science Society.

2023 – Present AuSIMM

2015 – Present American Society of Mining and Reclamation (ASMR)

Editorial boards/services

2025 - present: Member of Editorial Board, Energy & Environment Nexus

2022 – present: Associate editor (Soil), Reclamation Sciences

Awards & Patent

2019 UQ’s Partners in Research Excellence Award (Resilient Environments) (Rio Tinto and QAL)

2017 SMI-Industry Engagement Award, University of Queensland

2015 SMI-Inaugural Bright Research Ideas Forum Award, University of Queensland

2014 SMI-RHD Supervision Award, University of Queensland

2015 Foliar fertilizer US 20150266786. In. (Google Patents). Huang L, Nguyen AV, Rudolph V, Xu G (equal contribution)

Research interest: Monitoring ecosystem health of coral reefs and seagrass habitats, integrating field and remote sensing image datasets, and the developing applied cost-effective mapping and monitoring approaches. Developed approaches have been adopted as standard practice globally, making a difference in conservation of these valuable habitats. The long term monitoring studies at Heron and Moreton Bay formed the basis for the development of mapping and monitoring over time and space at local to global scale. See here major research impact

Major projects:

• Long term monitoring of benthic composition at Heron Reef (2002-ongoing).
• Long term monitoring of seagrass composition and abundance in Moreton bay Marine Park (2000-ongoing).
• Smart Sat CRC Hyperspectral Remote Sensing of Seagrass and Coral Reefs 2023-2027.
• Developement of Underwater Field Spectrometry and Benthic Photo Collection and Analysis
• 3D GBR Habitat Mapping Project 2015 - ongoing:
• Global habitat mapping project 2019-2023 Allen Coral Atlas .

Current position: Associate Professior in Marine Remote Sensing leading the Marine Ecosystem Monitoring Lab. . Academic Director Heron Island Research Station and affiliated researchers with Centre for Marine Science and Centre for Biodiversity and Conservation Science

Capacity Building and Citizen Science: Capacity: under/post graduate courses; Msc/PhD supervision, workshops/courses; Remote Sensing Educational Toolkit, and online courses (e.g. TNC).Strong supporter of citizen science based projects, as trainer, organiser and advisor for Reef Check Australia, CoralWatch, Great Reef Census and UniDive.

RESEARCH INTERESTS Fire Ecology, Restoration Ecology, Ecological Genomics, Wildlife Science, Conservation Biology, Invasive Plants

My research group studies fire ecology and conservation biology. Currently, we are working on:

• Using fire to benefit plant biodiversity and manage invasive plants
• Predicting effects of changing fire regimes on plant-animal interactions
• Native grassland restoration
• Biodiversity in agricultural landscapes

We have a special interest in plants and animals living in fire-prone areas because of the fascinating fact that these ecosystems are never static but continually re-shaped by cycles of fire and regeneration. While being grounded in fundamental biology and ecological theory, our research is always aimed at improving knowledge for biodiversity conservation. Our work has applications in fire management, biological invasion and threatened species conservation.

TECHNICAL APPROACHES: POPULATION GENETICS | SPATIAL LANDSCAPE GENETICS | DEMOGRAPHIC SIMULATION MODELLING | STATISTICAL MODELLING OF POPULATIONS & COMMUNITIES | BIOINFORMATICS | SPATIAL ANALYSIS IN R | We also know how to drop a hand-made 1 x 1 m polypipe quadrat on the ground and do good old-fashioned field work.

TEACHING: I teach ecology, wildlife science and environmental science at UQ. My teaching and coordination activities have included Elements of Ecology (AGRC1032), Wildlife Technology (ANIM3018) and People Fire & Environment (ENVM3215 / ENMV7530).

EDITORIAL I am Associate Editor for Wildlife Letters (2023–)

I was Associate Editor for Journal of Applied Ecology for four years (2018–2022).

CURRICULUM VITAE

• 2019 – current Lecturer, University of Queensland
• 2018 – 2022 Associate Editor, Journal of Applied Ecology
• 2018 – 2019 Marie Skłodowska-Curie Research Fellow, Trinity College Dublin
• 2016 – 2017 Post-doctoral Research Fellow, Trinity College Dublin
• 2015 – 2016 Post-doctoral Research Assistant, University of Melbourne
• 2015 – 2016 Self-employed Consultant Ecologist, Canberra
• 2012 – 2014 Post-doctoral Research Fellow, Australian National University

EDUCATION

2012 PhD in Ecology, Australian National University

2006 BSc in Biodiversity Conservation Honours, Flinders University

2005 BSc in Biodiversity Conservation, Flinders University

Corinne seeks to understand the organizing practices and processes that gradually and invisibly create risks that can worsen over time to become catastrophic. These ‘insidious risks’ were the focus of Corinne’s PhD in the UQ Business School where she identified three ways, on a spectrum of ways these risks are managed: blinkered, law-abiding and attentive. With more than 30 years’ experience in the mining sector, government, consulting and research, Corinne built upon her earth sciences background in mine rehabilitation and closure to become a qualitative researcher through her PhD. This provided a new lens and insights on how organisations manage elongated insidious risks, not only for mine affected water and land disturbance in mining but also during the progressive failure of the insurance market for extreme weather, in her postdoctoral research. In a voluntary capacity Corinne formed and led an ISO standards working group to finalise ISO 24419 Managing Mining Legacies in 2023 providing the first international standard on this topic together with case studies and a bibliography. She represents AusIMM in her standards work. Since 2019 Corinne has been a Board Member of the Victorian Government’s Mine Land Rehabilitation Authority providing oversight for three brown coal mine closures in the Latrobe Valley. Prior to her PhD Corinne developed the field of research in managing abandoned/legacy mines in the Centre for Mined Land Rehabilitation, SMI following her Churchill Fellowship research in 2009.

My research focusses on soil health in cropping and pasture systems, specialising in soil carbon and soil organic matter dynamics, microbial ecology, and plant-soil interactions. I am interested in how agronomic interventions impact soil health and in developing methods to reverse soil fertility decline and build healthier, more productive soils. This includes understanding the impacts of tillage, cover cropping, crop rotational diversity, nutrient management, and organic amendments on soil functional processes and crop development and productivity.

I have extensive experience in designing and analyzing field and glasshouse experiments and implementing advanced statistical models using R. I have excellent verbal and written communication skills, maintain positive relationships with collaborators both nationally and internationally, and publish manuscripts in peer-reviewed scientific journals.

I have over 10 years of research and work experience in the field of mining land rehabilitation, acquiring a total of>3.5 million in fund support from the Australian government, research council and mining companies. My extensive experience in industrial engagement, field trial design and application also increased my growth as the leader in sustainable mining waste management.

I am an Advanced Queensland research fellow in the leading global research group of Ecological Engineering of Mine Wastes at the Sustainable Mineral Institute (SMI). My research interest is investigating important molecular and cellular processes in eukaryotes that first arose in bacteria and archaea, and microbial metabolic activities control numerous geochemical cycles in soil formation for sustainable mineral waste management. I have intensive work experience on multiple representative mining wastes, including Cu-Au, Pb-Zn, Iron ore, Uranium mine waste rock and bauxite tailings and residues.

My research strength lies in my multidisciplinary work and research program spans the interface between environmental microbiology, geochemistry, and plants. My expertise includes 1) mineral characterization, 2) soil and rhizosphere element cycling, 3) next-generation sequencing and online-controlled bioreactor techniques. Through the integrated application of environmental 'omics approaches, stable isotope analysis and imaging would give new insights into the fundamental element cycling processes of mined land mining wastes, and upon which I could develop novel biotechnology and methodology to prime sustainable mined land management and bioinoculum product with the field validated designated performance.