Researcher biography
Michaela’s research focuses on decision-making for conservation problems. She is part of the National Environmental Science Program's Threatened Species Recovery Hub for which she looked invasive species management on Christmas Island.
We often have to act quickly to conserve threatened species, but we also need to minimise the potential for adverse outcomes of management actions. Finding methods for predicting the outcome of management actions in advance is therefore crucial, especially when little information about the system is available. Michaela’s interest has always involved interactions: in her PhD at The University of Melbourne, she focused on how to assess and manage interacting species when one is threatened and puts its interaction partner at risk. Her master’s thesis (at the Biodiversity and Climate Research Centre in Frankfurt) looked at interaction networks of frugivore birds in different habitats.