New team members: Katie White & Dennis Byrne

Welcome to Katie and Dennis who will be doing their BSc(Hons) year with CSIRO and the University of Western Australia.

Katie takes up a position working with us on her thesis entitled “Understanding climatic gradients as drivers in the growth rates, germination success and reproductive potential of Passiflora foetida.”   In this project we will be focusing on providing insight to improve the understanding of limits to weed survival to inform management of weed threats to biodiversity values. Katie is supervised by Bruce Webber, Karen Bell and Wolfgang Lewandrowski of Kings Park and Botanic Garden.

Dennis will be working with us on a thesis entitled “Exposing the historical biogeography of bitou bush invasions in Australia using molecular tools.”  This project will be looking to disentangle the introduction history of bitou bush across Australia to improve chances of local eradication and management effectiveness.  Dennis is supervised by Karen Bell, Bruce Webber and Pieter Poot.