Dr Diane Allen
Queensland Department of Science, Information Technology, Innovation and the Arts
Diane’s area of R&D interests are in soil health and soil nutrient cycling, focusing on carbon turnover, nutrient processes and greenhouse gas fluxes in forest, pasture, wetland and agricultural ecosystems. She has a strong focus on information provision for land management and decision support across a diverse audience including policymakers, scientists, government and land managers. These activities require a coordinated team effort, demonstrated national and international collaborative networks and an ability to think through practical application of R&D with land managers.
Developing a future vision for ‘healthiness’ in a changing climate relies upon networking a range of disciplines including the physical, biological, chemical and non-living environment. For the past 10 years, she has been working in a diverse cross-disciplinary team environment, researching how to quantify and describe healthy landscapes. She is keen to be involved in the problem-solving process: to identify the influences governing the decision-making process, to define ‘health’ in the Australian and global context, and to develop solutions for managing health across a range of integrated disciplines.
Associate Professor Hilary Bambrick
Centre for Health Research, School of Medicine, University of Western Sydney
Hilary’s research field is population health in the context of climate variability and change, with impacts and adaptation strategies to improve health in vulnerable populations at its core. Her projects are based in Australia (largely in disadvantaged urban and Indigenous communities), in Pacific Island countries, and in informal urban settlements (slums) in Ethiopia. She has made substantial independent and original contributions to both scholarship and public policy, including leading Australia’s health impact assessment for the Garnaut Climate Change Review (2008), the Health Synthesis Review for the Sydney Adaptation Strategy (2012) and the Climate Adaptation Strategy for Health for Samoa (2013).
Her experience in impacts and adaptation research ranges from the health outcomes she has studied (e.g. vector-borne, respiratory and gastroenteric diseases), the location and environment (Australian cities, rural Indigenous communities, African slums and Pacific Islands), and the populations of interest (the very young, the old, and in between). She delights in collaborating across disciplines to solve complex problems. With a background in bioanthropology and work in such diverse and disadvantaged settings, her public health / epidemiological perspective is accompanied by a well-developed understanding of the broader contexts, pressures and demands that render populations especially vulnerable, as well as the practice of developing, implementing and evaluating programs aimed at avoiding harm and building resilience.
Ms Melanie Bannister-Tyrrell
Clinical and Population Perinatal Health Research, Kolling Institute of Medical Research, University of Sydney
Melanie completed her Honours year (University Medallist) with Professor David Harley in 2010 investigating the impact of climate on dengue transmission in far north Queensland. She was the youngest invited speaker at a festschrift for Professor Tony McMichael’s work in environment and health over four decades, and has contributed a chapter to a forthcoming book that reflects on how the impacts of climate change on infectious diseases will be observed and measured. She begins a PhD in 2014 which will use a transdisciplinary ecohealth framework to explore the interactions between ecological change, population movements and malaria transmission.
Several studies have attempted to attribute changes in patterns of infectious diseases to recent climate change. However, methods for the detection and attribution of climate change impacts on human infectious diseases have not been clearly defined.
Dr Charmian Bennett
National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health, Australian National University
Four of Charmian’s research papers were cited in the IPCC 5th Assessment Report of 2014. These papers examine climate change impacts on seasonal deaths, impacts of heat and other factors on worker health, and aeroallergens, airborne dust and health). She has written a briefing paper and participated in a strategic planning meeting for the 2010 COAG National Climate Change Adaptation Action Plan. She was selected for the 2012 Future Thought Leaders Program 2012, which trained researchers and policymakers together in the concepts and methods of best-practice evidence-based policy-making and policy-based research translation.
She has expertise on the health impacts of extreme heat and changing air quality. I have a strong holistic understanding of complex processes that directly and indirectly link climate change to human health outcomes. Her multidisciplinary academic background comes from a PhD in epidemiology, postgraduate studies in geography and environmental health, and significant interdisciplinary research experience. She can understand, translate and synthesise knowledge and research techniques from a range of relevant disciplines and apply it to the myriad health challenges posed by climate change. She has a keen interest and growing understanding in the research–policy interface. She is an active participant in the University of Sydney’s Menzies Centre for Health Policy.
Associate Professor Grant Blashki 
Institute for Global Health, University of Melbourne
Grant is interested in the relationship between climate change and health. He is a former board director of the Australian Conservation Foundation, a strategic adviser to the Climate Institute, a co-founder of Doctors for the Environment Australia and chair of the Environmental Working Group of the World organisation of Family Doctors. He has published over 100 peer-reviewed papers and undertaken over $5 million of research projects in fields of interest including mental health and primary care.
He has raised the following issues for discussion by the forum:
Dr Jennifer Boddy
Human Services and Social Work, Griffith University
Jennifer’s research focuses on climate change, rural and remote practice, and social activism. She is particularly interested in the impacts of the environmental fallout of climate change on disadvantaged populations such as older people, women and those living in poverty. She wrote ‘Ecosocial work with marginalized populations: time for action on climate change’ in M Gray, J Coates and T Hetherington, eds (2013), Environmental social work. She is working on embedding environmental social work issues into core courses on the socio-political context of social work practice, research methods, and social work theory.
Her expertise in the effects of climate change on people’s health and wellbeing links directly with the forum theme of examining climate change challenges to health. With her background in the social sciences, she is able to make the links between the science of climate change and human health easily understandable to the general public and policy-makers. She has extensive knowledge of the psychosocial consequences of climate changes as well as the unintended and unexpected impacts. She enjoys working with others in a multidisciplinary context to make recommendations on how to reduce the negative impacts of climate change on health.
Ms Kathryn Bowen
National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health, Australian National University
Kathryn’s area of expertise is climate change and health. She has been at the National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health since 2008. Kathryn has worked in global health research and policy since 1999, across public, private and university sectors. She is a Research Fellow within the Earth System Governance project, and Fellow of the Adaptation College and the Centre for Sustainability Leadership. Kathryn is co-founder of Just Change, a climate change and equity organisation, and sits on an environment advisory committee for the City of Melbourne. Her main work is a range of consultancies for the World Health Organization (WHO country/regional offices) on climate change and health.
She has six years’ experience working in climate change and health research and policy activities. She has a broad perspective on the role of health within the climate change (both adaptation and mitigation) setting through her work as a lead researcher in an AusAID-funded project which engaged a range of sectors (such as water, agriculture, and disaster management), given the key links these sectors have with the health sector. She works with WHO in training and policy development, contributing current global developments to the discussion. On a more local level, she works with a project with the City of Melbourne on the importance of health in the way climate change is framed so as to strengthen its position of priority amongst other policies.
Mr Devin Bowles
National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health, Australian National University
Devin’s social science background is diverse and transdisciplinary, with publications in public health focusing on climate change, conflict prevention, history, and cognitive psychology. He has Honours degrees in anthropology and psychology, and an MA (Hons) in anthropology. His PhD by publication at the National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health focuses on climate change, conflict and health. He has conducted social research for the Australian Heritage Council. He is a senior project manager leading a research team of 10 at the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, and lead author of four reports of the institute.
With Professor Colin Butler, Devin has recently submitted for publication a systematic literature review on climate change, conflict and health. This review identified 29 published works on the topic (two of which Devin wrote). He has five book chapters in press, a recently published conference paper on the subject, and has presented on the topic at international conferences. He has benefited from collaboration with leading scholars in this field: Professor Tony McMichael, Professor Colin Butler, and Rear Admiral (retired) Neil Morisetti (UK). He has published a book chapter on how health care can diminish conflict risk. He is interested in other socio-economically mediated health effects of climate change, including undernutrition, social stress, inequality and migration.
Dr Jaclyn Brown
Marine and Atmospheric Research, CSIRO
There is a difference between providing climate change information and providing information that is useful to decision makers. Jaclyn has worked with stakeholders to deliver information that is relevant and useful for the decisions they need to make on water security, temperature extremes, appropriate climate indices for agriculture, and oceanic changes that alter fish habitats. Part of this information is communicating the uncertainty in the projections while still taking into account the possibilities of high-risk events.
Her expertise as a climate change scientist helps her understanding of the expected climate change that we need to plan for, and allows her to see ways in which the provided climate change information can be used to help understand the relevant variables to human health – not just in the details of temperature, rainfall, drought and cyclones, but in the subtleties around humidity, favourable growing weather for agriculture or the spread of disease.
Dr Stuart Corney
Antarctic Climate and Ecosystem Co-operative Research Centre University of Tasmania
From 2007 to 2011 Stuart was the climate systems modeller for the Climate Futures for Tasmania project. This project focused on the delivery of relevant climate research and information for Tasmania. The key research innovation was the combining of meteorology/climate models with water runoff, river and electricity market models, flood, storm surge and wind hazards models, and agricultural models (for example pasture growth) to understand how climate change will affect businesses in Tasmania at the decision making level. Since 2011 he has been working on the development of an end-to-end ecosystem model for the Southern Ocean to explore the response of the marine ecosystem to climate change.
His expertise in the use of high resolution climate models and in delivering relevant information from these models to a range of stakeholders, including those with expertise in hydrology, agriculture, health and emergency management speaks both to his expertise in climate modelling and his ability to communicate the implications and challenges of climate change to a broad scientific audience. Through his experience with Climate Futures for Tasmania he developed a passion for incorporating climate model projections into a range of research areas where the changing climate is likely to have a significant impact. In 2012, he was part of the Climate Futures for Tasmania team that won the national Resilient Australia awards (Education and Research section) administered by the Federal Attorney-General’s Department, for providing advice to the Tasmanian emergency management community on the challenges that the impacts of climate change may bring to emergency managers in Tasmania.
Mr Tim Cowan
Marine and Atmospheric Research, CSIRO
Tim’s interests include understanding climate model projections of heatwaves across Australia. He has researched how tropical Indian Ocean effects on the climate and weather of southern Australia might lead to major bushfires. Indian Ocean positive dipole events are likely to increase, and enhance the risk of major bushfires across southern Australia in summer.
His work suggests that heatwaves across Australia will become more frequent, longer and much hotter by the latter part of this century, and this should be of great concern for Australian communities. He is therefore keen to engage with researchers and decision-makers from other fields, such as health, social sciences and biodiversity, to better understand the impacts of these changes, and how his research can possibly be better targeted towards the needs of end users. He can provide Think Tank participants with a long-term picture of projected future changes in extreme events, including heatwaves and climate extremes, which influence drought and bushfires. Engaging with other EMCRs will initiate ideas about how our extremes research can be used to benefit those affected by climate change.
Dr Amanda Davies
Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Curtin University
As a human geographer, Amanda’s research has focused on examining socio-economic change and adaptation in livelihoods and communities in response to external pressures, especially in rural and coastal communities. It has focused on identifying the social, economic and institutional factors that underpin resilience and adaptive capacity in rural and coastal primary resource dependent communities. These communities are particularly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. She has undertaken cross-cultural studies on population migration, factors influencing population mobility and the migration decision-making process, utilising a ‘livelihoods framework’ to understand population mobility/ migration.
As the climate changes, outmigration is an adaptation strategy for many communities, particularly low-lying coastal and marginal rural communities. Tens of millions of people are likely to be forced to move away from their home community/ country as a result of climate related changes to the natural environment. For individuals, making the decision to migrate away from a home community can be stressful and upsetting. Migrants lose social networks, a sense of belonging to place and their livelihood. They may face isolation and unemployment in their destination community. Outmigration can result in negative social, economic and wellbeing implications for the remaining population, and migration can place increased pressure on the social and economic infrastructure and impact the wellbeing of receiving communities. Amanda will contribute to discussions about the implications of climate change for individual and community health where outmigration is likely to be an adaptation strategy.
Associate Professor Greg Devine
Infectious Diseases, QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute
Greg spent 10 years in dengue and malaria endemic regions (Peru, Tanzania and north Queensland) working on disease vectors and consulting for the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and local control programs. He has a major interest in one of the most dramatic adaptations to environment (insecticide resistance) and has managed or consulted on projects that assess how transmission risks are mediated by human behaviour (logging, land use, vector control tools). He is involved in Australian modelling initiatives that predict the impacts of climate and environment on dengue transmission. His lab is increasingly interested in the ecology of invasive mosquitoes and related cost-benefit analyses.
He became head of the Mosquito Control Laboratory, QIMR Berghofer in July 2013. The lab manages unique quarantine and insectary facilities and maintains a range of mosquitoes including important invasive species. He is president of the Mosquito and Arbovirus Research Committee, Queensland, which sets the research agenda for mosquito-borne disease among the councils and state interests. We examine the influence of landscape, ecosystems and human behaviour on vector competence, adaptation, density and disease transmission. Climate change is just one of many interacting forces that drive the spatial and temporal dynamics of mosquito-borne diseases (others include changes in land use, species invasions and urbanisation) and that may encourage the establishment or expansion of new or existing pathogens. Mosquitoes and the diseases that they can transmit are excellent models for investigating the health and societal impacts of climate change and its interactions with landscape and human behaviour.
Dr Ning Ding
National Centre of Epidemiology and Population Health, Australian National University
Faculty of Health, University of Canberra
Ning is a postdoctoral research fellow investigating the relationship between social capital, climate change and health, working at the National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health at the Australian National University and with Professor Helen Berry at the University of Canberra. His research has the following two themes:
1. the relationship between social capital (including community participation behaviour, trust and social support), community resilience in times of hardship, and mental health, and
2. the effect of extreme weather events, such as those expected to be exacerbated by climate change (e.g. drought, extreme temperatures, humidity and bushfires) on mental and general health.
He has a doctoral degree in physics from the Beijing Normal University in 2008. Four further years of doctoral study in economics and subsequent postdoctoral training at the ANU College of Business and Economics have enhanced his critical thinking ability and familiarised him with many sophisticated techniques in the quantitative analysis of big data. Since graduation, with the help of panel data and panel analysis techniques, he has demonstrated a causal association between extreme weather events such as heat and humidity and worse mental health, and a causal relationship between greater social capital and better mental health. In both cases, these are world-first findings. His research can thus provide insights into the potential health impacts of climate change and extreme weather events, and the protective role that community functioning can play in this dynamic, helping to fill a vital gap in scientific knowledge. Constructive evidence-based advice and analysis of implications can contribute to policy initiatives that will really work to tackle the big health problems that will increasingly be caused by climate change. He can contribute to the Think Tank with his economic expertise and analysis skill, for example, in calculating ‘health and social costs of carbon’ and modelling the implications of growth for emissions and, ultimately, for different aspects of health.
Dr Efrat Eilam 
College of Education, Victoria University
Efrat’s main research area focuses on sustainability education. In 2008, he and a colleague established the Israeli Forum for Sustainability Education, an inter-university organisation bringing together Israeli academics researching sustainability education who meet quarterly each year. He has published seven peer-reviewed articles on sustainability education. His recent research focuses on examining climate change education, and recently supervised a Masters thesis examining implementation within the Israeli school systems. He plans to extend the research to examining Australian school policy on this topic.
He will contribute to the forum by highlighting the role of education in preparing societies for climate change and increasing resilience. His recent research highlighted the urgent need to educate for climate change, and showed that climate change education has to take place in both formal and informal settings. He has studied the sources of influence on adult attitudes to environmental issues, finding that the main influencing factor was ‘My past and present close relationships and myself as a citizen’. He hopes to contribute to the Think Tank discussions by unfolding the meaning and implications of this prime factor, with regards to preparing societies, both in terms of prevention and mitigation.
Dr Aharon Factor
Swinburne Business School, Swinburne University of Technology
Aharon is interested in the relationship between business and environmental sustainability. His biology degree and Masters in Environmental Science, Technology and Policy give him a multidisciplinary approach. His PhD research focused on the influence of societal stakeholders on the owner/managers of small and medium size biotechnology companies. He won a government research grant to investigate environmental sustainability in Melbourne’s small and medium size manufacturing companies. His research used both quantitative and qualitative methods to examine 350 companies. It provides an in-depth analysis of both environmental behaviour of these companies and the deeper perceptual and decision-making processes of selected companies. Data collection ended in 2012 and under review for publication.
He brings to the forum knowledge of the implications of climate change for small businesses which play such an important role in the Australian economy. His research demonstrates that such businesses are highly sensitive to resource variability (especially energy sourcing) and are often inextricably a component of complex supply chains and networks. The effect of climate change has great potential to disrupt their functioning. Particularly concerning is the potential for increasing economic stress, mental health effects on owner/managers and job losses in community. He can discuss these issues in the context of the impact on livelihood and disadvantage in Australian local communities.
Dr Helen Faddy 
Research and Development, Australian Red Cross Blood Service
Helen’s research investigates risks to the safety of the Australian blood supply, and has direct implications for public health and policy. She has focused on the provision of an evidence-base to enable the evaluation of current emerging infectious risks in the context of the safety of the Australian blood supply. To achieve this she used epidemiological investigations coupled with modelling approaches to provide an evidence-base for assessing risk. Her research strives to improve the way we model the risk posed by emerging infectious diseases with an overall aim of informing sound, science-based policies for protecting Australia’s blood supply.
Infectious diseases pose a serious risk to our nation’s blood supply, which are projected to escalate with changes to the global climate. Blood transfusions are an essential component of modern medicine, and one in three Australians are expected to require a blood transfusion in their lifetime. Thus blood safety is critically important to the health of ordinary Australians, and her research seeks to understand and manage risks associated with emerging diseases. She will be therefore able to bring a novel angle to the Think Tank, which might otherwise be overlooked.
Ms Dale Fallon 
School of Environment, Science and Engineering, Southern Cross University
Dale is researching local government response to climate change. Her thesis will use systems theory as a conceptual framework to explore limits to both mitigation and adaptation to climate change. She has researched the activities of all 152 NSW local governments, to get a broader view of local government by studying rural as well as the more commonly researched city organisations. She works in a voluntary capacity with a local government council to help them implement their greenhouse plan. In this capacity, she also chairs a subgroup hoping to introduce carbon farming practices to the shire.
Her first degree was in agriculture. After five years in the rice industry researching post-harvest management of rice and rice products to the consumer, she spent four years working for local government researching water supply and waste water issues. She (and her partner) have managed their own farm for 10 years. She has spent eight years providing training to both local council workers (parks and gardens) and farmers, and knows firsthand how the food and water supply industries work. She is very aware of rural issues and the plight of farmers, experience which will be useful to the group in discussions.
Dr Brad Farrant 
Population Sciences, Telethon Kids Institute, University of Western Australia
Brad has an ongoing interest in how broader ecological factors like climate change will interact to affect children’s development now and in the future. He has published on climate change, child health and wellbeing in the journal Tropical Medicine and International Health, in an upcoming book chapter, and in the mainstream media including The Conversation and Crikey. He is the Australian Research Alliance for Children and Youth’s representative on the Climate and Health Alliance’s committee of management and a guest editor for a special edition of the new international journal Children on the impact of climate change on child health.
Children are innocent and non-consenting victims of climate change. They are particularly vulnerable to its negative effects because of their immature neurobiology and physiological systems. The importance of early childhood development is critical to a full analysis of climate change risks and risk reduction options. Brad’s background in early childhood development research across a broad range of areas (e.g. early language and socio-cognitive development, parenting, behaviour development) and his work on the intersection with climate change risk means that he has much to contribute to the Think Tank. For example, his research with disadvantaged and Indigenous children would add significantly to the conversation about the health and interrelated social impacts associated with climate related changes in livelihood and disadvantage. Similarly, his research into the community, family and parental factors that are important for positive early childhood development has implications for the discussion of security, social cohesion and conflict.
Dr Aysha Fleming 
Science into Society Group, CSIRO
Aysha’s research work focuses on climate change responses in primary producers, especially farmers, winemakers and fishers. Current work explores transformation (fundamental change) for climate change and all of the risks and opportunities involved. Health was identified as one of these important factors. She contends that mental health (stress) is both caused by, and a barrier to, climate change responses and is keen to explore this hypothesis further. There are also other factors around health to pursue, including the role of social networks, social capital, age and experience of extreme events in improving or decreasing climate change responses.
She is a social researcher, interviewing people about climate change. She has found that there is confusion and concern about climate change. She is very interested in being involved in the Think Tank because she has found health and climate change to be particularly important in her research. Health affects how farmers and fishers think about climate change, as well as what actions they are able to take, and health is also affected by the effects of climate change that are already occurring – physical and social/political. In her recent work, especially in terms of mental health (stress), but not exclusively, she is trying to explore the complex relationship between health and climate change. As the cohort that she researches is also an ageing demographic, health has a range of impacts in that regard also. She will contribute her direct experiences with primary producers and knowledge of social science methods/literature.
Dr Sallie Forrest 
Doctors for the Environment Australia and Fremantle Hospital and Health Service
Sally joined Doctors for the Environment Australia as WA Student Representative whilst studying for an MBBS with Honours. In 2012, she completed a Masters of Science in Public Health (Environment and Health Stream) with Distinction at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Her thesis, ‘Estimating the Health and Greenhouse Gas Impacts of Electrically-Assisted Bicycle Use in Perth, Western Australia’, achieved the highest possible mark. A subsequent internship at the World Health Organization’s European Centre for Environment and Health focused on health impacts of climate change in the European Region, and health co-benefits of mitigation. She has since completed further clinical training, and volunteers for Doctors for the Environment Australia.
She can contribute a wide understanding of the health impacts of climate change, developed while studying. She has a particular understanding of the scientific basis for measuring heatwave and air pollution impacts, and can contribute a social sciences approach. Her Masters in Public Health and current role as a clinical doctor give her an understanding of social impacts. As a result of work at the WHO on health impacts of climate change and policy responses in the European Region, she can offer an international perspective on research and policies to mitigate and adapt to health impacts. Her role with Doctors for the Environment Australia in the political sphere represents an ability to offer insight into policy-relevant research. She can consider synergies with other areas of health, such as ‘health co-benefits’ of climate change mitigation and adaptation.
Dr Judith Fernandez-Piquer 
Food Safety Centre / Tasmanian Institute of Agriculture, School of Land and Food, University of Tasmania
Judith’s research has facilitated the development of tools to evaluate microbial food safety and quality during harvesting, processing and distribution. Judith’s expertise –a mixture of engineering, food technology and microbiology – is now embodied in mathematical models that predict changes in microbial populations in foods. In her doctoral studies she developed predictive models for pathogen proliferation in seafood products subjected to the fluctuating temperatures (from harvest to consumer). That experience has been extended to modelling risks in milk from the farm to milk processing plants and development of decision-support tools that have been embraced by the Victorian dairy industry.
Judith’s work aims to increase the availability and specificity of tools to monitor microbial quality and safety of foods in real-time in supply chains. She is confident that predictive microbiology models and new sensor and data-logging technologies can provide an indication of the safety and quality of food products during distribution. Importantly, predicted long-term increases in the temperature of waters from which shellfish are grown and harvested and in ambient air temperatures affecting food distribution, can translate to increased bacterial growth in/on food products and reduction of shelf life or increased food-borne disease risk due to increased pathogen growth. The development and use of predictive models and sensor/data-logging technologies can help to quantify the effects of temperature changes, and be used to find optimal conditions during processing and distribution, to minimise the possibility of microbial hazards in foods and, from that, to protect public health.
Dr Ailie Gallant
School of Geography and Environmental Science, Monash University
Ailie’s research examines changes and variability in climate extremes in Australia and their associated physical processes. This includes research on extreme temperatures, drought and heavy rainfall. Her work has highlighted significant changes in high-impact climate events that are strongly relevant to both physical and mental health. She is supervising two PhD students working on problems directly related to climate extremes and health in urban environments, including climate change and urban heat island effects. This is part of projects run through the Cooperative Research Centre for Water Sensitive Cities in which she is a Partner Investigator.
Climate extremes, including extreme temperatures, drought and extreme rainfall can have acute effects on the physical and mental wellbeing of Australians. She brings expertise on the climatology of these extreme climatic events, and their likely changes with climate change, to the Think Tank. Her expertise includes knowledge on the future changes in climate extremes in Australia. She understands the nuances of regional climate change projections with climate change, including the uncertainties in these projections. These uncertainties will play a significant role in how we develop thinking around the challenges to health risk by climate change.
Dr Donna Green
Climate Change Research Centre, University of New South Wales
Donna has researched and published about climate extremes and human health. She leads a multidisciplinary NHMRC project grant in this research field, and is building a graduate and postgraduate group studying climate extremes and human health in large urban areas in industrialised and industrialising cities around the world.
She can contribute to the key areas of (1) temperature and extreme weather events and impacts on human health, and (4) livelihood and disadvantage. Her research experience with climate experts on the impacts of extreme weather on human health, and a decade of experience working with Indigenous communities in northern Australia and the socio-economic differences will provide context and knowledge to draw from to engage with other researchers. She is experienced in bringing together research teams that include experts from a range of faculties (law, science, built environment, social science), a skill relevant to the Think Tank’s multidisciplinary research agenda.
Dr Yuming Guo
Division of Epidemiology of Biostatistics, University of Queensland
Yuming’s research interest is in assessment of the impacts of environmental risk factors on health using advanced statistical models. He is developing/participating in an international collaboration to assess the disease burden of global climate change on human health. His research findings have been published by peer-reviewed journal, and he is a peer reviewer for many of them.
With much experience in the preventive medicine, environmental epidemiology and biostatistics, he is uniquely placed to understand challenges to health in the context of climate change. He understands the gaps in climate change and health field when translating the research findings to policy making. As a biostatistician, he has unique insights into the potential knowledge/skills gaps that may limit both the effective utilisation of cutting-edge climate change data, and subsequent interpretation and translation of results. He routinely communicates with scientists from different disciplines. He leads and participates in analyses for several international collaborations and, in this capacity, liaises with scientists with diverse perspectives to encourage multidisciplinary approaches to problem-solving.
Dr Anthony Halog 
School of Geography, Planning and Environmental Management, University of Queensland
Anthony is a lecturer in environmental management. He has taught and held various fellowship positions in the USA, Finland, Japan, Canada and Germany. In conjunction with tacking global systemic issues such as climate change and adaptation, food security, and resource management, he has been analysing the implications of further development of human engineered systems by systems science-based approaches. He is developing the research project ‘Dynamic System Modelling of Relationships between Environmental Sustainability, Food and Health Issues’. This aims to develop a prototype system model for understanding the interrelationship between climate change, food systems, dietary choices and human health.
He can contribute to the discussion of health consequences of climate change due to increasing atmospheric greenhouse gas emissions. The public health issues of imbalanced nutrition, inadequate access to food security and misappropriation of resources are seen globally and affect billions of people. They are compounded by an inadequate access to nutritious food, plus large scarcities building up in the world of global agriculture. Among these scarcities are those of arable land, fresh water, fossil fuels for energy and for fertiliser production, appropriate farm technology and access to this technology, and fish supplies. Food prices have risen sharply from two main causes: investors who are speculating on growth and the price of grain and the conversion of would-be food products to ethanol for use as biofuels. Water quality for consumption and agriculture is tightly linked to this dynamic. The use of food crops for biofuel production and energy, as opposed for consumption is causing direct public harm.
Dr Alana Hansen 
Discipline of Public Health, University of Adelaide
Alana’s research interests span several areas of environmental health. Her PhD was entitled ‘Risk Assessment for Environmental Health in Adelaide based on Weather, Air Pollution and Population Health Outcomes’. Her postgraduate research has focused on the health impacts of extreme heat and climate change on population health, particularly in the context of vulnerable populations such as the elderly and culturally and linguistically diverse communities. She is researching climate change effects on emerging and re-emerging vector-borne and rodent-borne climate sensitive diseases in China, with case studies on malaria, dengue fever and haemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome.
She can contribute to the Think Tank given her background in science and environmental epidemiology, and her experience with the translation of evidence-based research into policy and practice. She has been researching extreme heat and climate change health impacts for eight years. As a consequence of her recent study (a National Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility funded project) she chairs the South Australian Extreme Heat and CALD Communities Working Group. In the 2013–14 summer the group produced fact sheets in 20 languages other than English, on ‘staying healthy in the heat’ for migrant populations. These were forwarded to stakeholders and uploaded onto the SA Health website. She can therefore contribute advice and suggestions regarding community and stakeholder engagement; and working with policymakers to raise awareness of, and action on, the need for adaptive measures to curb the negative health impacts of climate change-driven extreme weather events.
Dr Scott Hanson-Easey
School of Population Health, University of Adelaide
Scott’s research helps delineate how people make meaning out of social and physical phenomena, and how particular discourses shape people’s ability to live in equitable, sustainable and healthy communities. Since 2012, he has conducted mixed-methods research on public risk perception of climate change. His current project, employing a qualitative, culture-centred approach, investigates how preparedness and risk messages could be more effectively fashioned to meet the discrete needs of culturally and linguistically diverse communities in South Australia.
Through the course of his research it has become clear that people’s every-day social context, histories, and cultural backgrounds are closely interwoven with perceptions of climate change risk and adaptation ability. This is especially salient for some culturally and linguistically diverse communities, because their social and financial status can seriously limit their choice of protective measures. He can provide the Think Tank with a social scientific lens on climate change, discuss its differential impact on social groups, and explore pathways to meaningfully engaging vulnerable groups and relevant stakeholders in dialogue that could inform social policy and strategic risk communication. He argues that this issue has important implications for social cohesion now and in the future, where a changing climate will exacerbate social inequality, elicit conflict, and undermine the social fabric. Discussing this topic with interdisciplinary colleagues would be a profitable exercise in further conceptualising the problem and its potential solutions.
Dr Rebecca Harris 
Antarctic Climate Ecosystem CRC, University of Tasmania
Rebecca is an ecologist with a particular interest in the impacts of climate change on human and natural systems. Her PhD research was in the area of thermal biology, giving her an excellent understanding of adaptive mechanisms such as behaviour and physiology, and the impact of thermal thresholds (extremes), humidity (effective temperatures), and diurnal temperature range on animals (including humans). Her current research uses climate model output to investigate changes in agricultural indices (growing degree days, soil moisture and productivity indices); shifts in species distributions, particularly agricultural pests and invasive species; and changes to bushfire danger with future climate change.
She brings experience relevant to many of the areas of interest to the Think Tank. Much of her research focuses on the risks that climate change poses to human health directly, through the impact of heatwaves and bushfires, and indirectly, through changes to agricultural productivity and pest distributions. Her contribution will be practical as well as theoretical. She works with natural resource management groups to develop climate change adaptation strategies, to reduce risk, recognise opportunities, and build their capacity to make the best use of climate change research. She also facilitates the use of climate model output across an interdisciplinary research group, The Landscapes and Policy Hub. She can explain climate models and impacts research to people from different disciplines and backgrounds. She has developed strategies for communicating the certainty and uncertainty in climate change science, which she believes is one of the major barriers to action.
Dr Gilly Hendrie 
Animal, Food and Health Sciences, CSIRO
Food is fundamental to our population’s health. Gilly’s current research focuses on promoting sustainable dietary behaviours to increase health and wellbeing in Australians. She has an interest in understanding population eating patterns, including estimating the nutrient, health and environmental implications of the average Australian diet and government nutrition recommendations. In collaboration with CSIRO’s agriculture and climate scientists, she has written a landmark paper to quantify the greenhouse gas emissions related to the Australian diet. She has also designed many phone apps and website-style interventions to change, support, and monitor dietary behaviour change for health and obesity. Promoting dietary patterns that improve health, reduce disease risk, and that are environmentally responsible is a challenge relevant to the Think Tank.
A changing climate may put pressure on Australia’s food supply. Having a detailed understanding of Australian adults and children’s food preferences and dietary intake, as well as knowledge of the latest nutrition recommendations, she can contribute to the discussions around the food supply challenges resulting from climate change. She can also provide expertise to the Think Tank conversations on factors that influence food preference, willingness to accept changes in food choices, and the broader health and wellbeing implications of a changing food supply. Her research in the area of obesity means she will bring knowledge of government initiatives to address overconsumption, which have benefits for both health and the environment.
Dr Jamie Hosking
Section of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, University of Auckland
Jamie is a public health physician by training, and his interests are in the impacts of policies on health equity and climate change. He is undertaking a PhD in this area, focusing on transport policies. He was lead author of a World Health Organization (WHO) report on the health benefits of climate change mitigation in the transport sector, and has reviewed climate change and health research for the WHO. He has a particular interest in vulnerable populations and has authored a review article on child health and climate change in Australasia.
He brings a broad public health background to the Think Tank. However, his particular interest is the impacts of climate change on health equity and social disadvantage. In the context of this workshop, he will be interested in analysing the equity implications of different policy options, and where possible identifying policies that improve both overall health and health equity. He thinks the interface between adaptation and mitigation is important, and would like to contribute to identifying future solutions that respond to the dual challenges of maximising resilience to climate change impacts and minimising emissions and operating in a carbon-constrained context. He will draw on his research reviewing climate change and health research gaps to help identify local research gaps and future research opportunities.
Dr Bethany Hoye 
Centre for Integrative Ecology, School of Life and Environmental Sciences, Deakin University
Bethany’s research lies at the interface between human society, ecological interactions, and evolutionary trajectories, investigating: how host movements, particularly migrations, shape infection dynamics; how infection, in turn, shapes host behaviour; and how environmental conditions and ecological communities, and changes to these, modify host-pathogen interactions. She combines experiments, large-scale spatial and temporal observations, molecular tools and ecological modelling, but the complex nature of these issues has meant that she benefits from, and is committed to, integration between traditionally disparate disciplines, exemplified by her current involvement in the ‘Linking biodiversity and ecosystem services’ project at the National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center (SESYNC), USA.
Although infectious diseases are traditionally considered a branch of medical science, they are inherently ecological systems, involving interactions among at least two, and often many, species. Moreover, emerging infectious diseases are dominated by zoonoses (infections acquired from animals), most of which originate in wildlife. Given that field of ecology seeks to understand and make predictions regarding biological patterns, she believes that discussion of the risks to human health through climate change, and on how science may contribute to mitigation strategies, would greatly benefit from the inclusion of ecological expertise. With a background in fundamental ecology, research interests spanning infectious diseases in both humans and animals, and current research assessing the value of biodiversity to human health (through SESYNC) and the impact of global change processes on infection and behaviour in migratory shorebirds, she will add a novel yet highly valuable dimension to the Think Tank.
Dr Wenbiao Hu 
School of Public Health, Queensland University of Technology
Wenbiao’s research interests are infectious disease ecology and epidemiology. He has published 78 peer-reviewed articles (54 in the last five years) in international and national journals. He has a leadership role in the NHMRC project between China (China Centre for Disease Control and Prevention) and Australia. He has supervised six PhD students, two Masters research students and one Masters research dissertation to completion.
He can contribute on the topics of modelling infectious diseases and climate change, how to develop an early warning system for infectious diseases based on climate data and how to develop a framework based on climatic factors for a future regional network of infectious diseases in the Asia-Pacific region
Dr Cunrui Huang
Centre for Environment and Population Health, Griffith University
Cunrui is a postdoctoral fellow working on environmental epidemiology and health policy, with a particular interest in the health effects of extreme temperatures. He is skilled in multidisciplinary research, and his publications cover climate change, environmental epidemiology, preventive medicine and public health.
He brings to the Think Tank a valuable mix of skills and experience in climate change and public health research. He will contribute to the discussion of the major issues and knowledge gaps in climate change challenges to health.
Dr Sarah James
Regulatory Institutions Network, Australian National University
Sarah combines qualitative and quantitative research linking food systems, climate change, population health and social equity. Her PhD and previous postdoctoral work primarily focussed primarily on urban food systems and peri-urban agriculture. Her current postdoctoral work builds on this in three projects examining the social, economic and political implications of climate change and food sustainability more broadly: (1) CSIRO research cluster fund:’ Identifying resilient urban food systems to promote population health in a changing climate’; (2) ARC discovery: ‘Creating consumer demand for healthy and sustainable food practices’; (3) ARC Linkage: ‘Australian future food scenarios’
She brings expertise on the climate change/health/food nexus from beyond the health field. Coming from a social science background, she can offer insight into the challenges and opportunities for a more sustainable food system and the impact on these of various social, cultural, political and economic factors across different geographical contexts. She also brings expertise and experience in addressing the complexities inherent in this area of research, and the adoption of a ‘whole of systems’ perspective to identify opportunities for action. This is most recently evident in her work on urban food system sustainability for the CSIRO project. She can contribute to the critical process of knowledge translation for evidence informed policy and practice, as seen in the incorporation of her previous research on preserving peri-urban farmland into the Sydney 2010 Metropolitan Strategy. She is researching to develop policy options to support healthy and sustainable food behaviours.
Dr Vanessa Kellermann
Biological Sciences, Monash University
Managing biodiversity at a time of unprecedented climate change – whether it involves anticipating the likelihood of extinction of a vulnerable species or the spread of a particular disease vector – hinges on our ability to accurately predict the responses of species to current and future environmental change. Vanessa aims to understand the evolutionary processes that shape current species distributions. Until her recent maternity leave she was employed as a full-time research associate both in Australia and Europe. She now works part-time, funded by the Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA) scheme.
Her research examines the extent to which shared characteristics that make species more susceptible under climate change scenarios are distributed across a phylogeny. This distribution may not be random but biased by species groups. If we find such a bias we can utilise this to predict species’ response to climate change. This will allow for targeted research informed by phylogeny, reducing the need for large-scale phenotypic studies. It will also facilitate more accurate and feasible predictions of risk across a range of taxa, including vulnerable species at risk of extinction and disease vectors whose distribution may expand under climate change. She brings an evolutionary focus to understanding how climate change scenarios will alter disease vector distributions. Using a species comparative phylogenetic framework we can predict how species will shift their distribution under climate change scenarios, and which species are more likely to expand their distributions and become invasive.
Dr Tim Law
Architecture and Design, University of Tasmania 
Tim’s research is in thermal comfort under energy constraints, with particular application to health and productivity in the workplace. He invented and continues to develop a personal air-conditioning unit whose development required expertise in architecture, engineering, thermal physiology and business. His interest in innovation and entrepreneurialism has achieved success in business competitions, received a grant from Commercialisation Australia and has been filed for national phase patents. His thesis ‘The Future of Thermal Comfort in an Energy-Constrained World’ is published by Springer. He publishes with the American Society of Heating, Refrigeration and Air-conditioning Engineers, and the International Society for Indoor Air Quality.
Air-conditioning has been a major contributor to climate change with its dual impact of massive power consumption and refrigerant leakage with high global warming potential. However in developed countries, it remains an important interim mitigator of heatwaves. In developing countries it is seen as a promoter for office productivity and a way of progressing into knowledge-based economies. Having studied air-conditioning at length from the perspectives of thermal comfort scientist, architect, engineer, property developer and building operations manager, he can make a meaningful contribution to any discussion involving climate control. Climate change is a problem too complex to be solved by science alone and requires a multidisciplinary perspective of this sort. His commercialisation experience will be important for transferring research into reality.
Dr Sophie Lewis
School of Earth Sciences, University of Melbourne, ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science
Sophie’s current research investigates extreme climate events in Australia and particularly the role of human influences in recent observed extreme climate events, such as heatwaves and floods. She uses large ensembles of climate model simulations to examine future changes in the severity and frequency of climate extremes. Her research has demonstrated that record-breaking temperatures observed in Australia in 2013 were substantially influenced by anthropogenic factors, such as greenhouse gas emissions, and that extreme temperatures are becoming more frequent and severe. Overall, she is interested in physical climate processes, extreme climate events and the impact on human and natural systems.
Through her research on recent temperature extremes in Australia, she can contribute to working group 1 (Temperature and extreme weather events). She has a good understanding of the science underpinning climate change and also of changes in the probability of extreme climate and weather events under future greenhouse gas warming. Although Australia has a naturally variable climate, human and natural systems are particularly vulnerable to these future extremes. In particular, she is eager to discuss the science of climate extremes in a cross-disciplinary setting, particularly the implications of changing heat extremes on human health. She has experience in communicating climate science to a broad range of audiences, including through articles on The Conversation in 2012–14, and through a placement as a scientist in residence in Melbourne at The Age newspaper at the time of the release of the Fifth Assessment Report of the IPCC in September 2013.
Dr Peter Liddicoat 
School of Aerospace, Mechanical and Mechatronic Engineering, University of Sydney
Peter is a research engineer, for whom performing high-impact science, communicating it to wider audiences, and translating it from lab science to real-world engineering is a passion. He has published journal papers on climate change relevant science nanostructured materials for medical and civil structures, and catalysis materials for energy production, and has worked to create multiple science communication products to bring this science to Australians and the world.
Many of the challenges to climate change require revising approaches to civil engineering and finding application of new technologies. But there doesn’t appear to be an engineer on the Think Tank steering committee. He is concerned that research engineers may not see their relevance to the title ‘Climate change challenges to health’, although they are a big part of impacting health. The solutions for future climate change challenges in areas such as communications, firefighting, energy production, agriculture, water purification, security, and resisting extreme weather, will be heavily engineering-based. The proposed Think Tank solution framework (p.4 of draft program) specifically targets risk reduction prospects and research opportunities we need to take now to prepare science-based actions. Peter believes he can help contribute possible avenues for science research that will enable improved engineering solutions to climate change risks.
Dr Margaret Loughnan 
Geography and Environmental Science, Monash University
Margaret is a health geographer with expertise in climate health relationships specialising in heat stress and spatial determinants of population vulnerably. Her recent work includes developing vulnerability maps and threshold temperatures for the Victorian Department of Health, identifying heat-health thresholds and describing the spatial vulnerability of urban populations and related emergency service demands for all Australian capital cities during heat events. She recently extended this research to examine heat adaptive behaviours and community resilience in regional towns. She worked as a visiting scientist with the SIMMER project at the Research Applications Laboratory of the US National Centre for Atmospheric Research in 2010.
She has researched climate and health for the past nine years and has 26 publications related to climate change, heat stress, population vulnerability and human health. She comes from a healthcare background, and has worked with colleagues from Monash Weather and Climate for the past five years. During this time she gained considerable insight into climate, urban climatology and climate change and how this impacts on human health. She is interested in the social determinants of vulnerability to climate change and has conducted focus groups and household interviews in high risk populations in northern Victoria. In addition to her work on extreme heat events her Honours thesis examined a Barmah Forest virus outbreak in the Gippsland lakes region in 2002. She has had a keen interest in arboviral disease and has established links with Dr Mary Hayden from the National Center for Atmospheric Research working on dengue virus in the US and Mexico.
Dr Anna Lyth 
Geography and Environmental Studies, School of Land and Food, University of Tasmania
Anna is particularly interested in complex and indirect health implications of climate change and integrated approaches to vulnerability assessment and adaptation response. She has recently worked on Ross River virus vulnerability, bringing together a range of professional groups (health service practitioners to urban planners and natural resource managers) in vulnerability and adaptation projects (NSW and Tasmania). Other current research includes the exploration of health and wellbeing impacts of bushfire smoke and management strategies. As a current member of the Tasmanian Climate Action Council she is also engaged in State Government advisory and policy work around climate change.
Anna is an integrated systems thinker bridging ecological and social systems to consider health and well-being vulnerability for regions in a changing climate. She is particularly interested in the indirect health implications of climate change and other influencing pressures and how social systems respond. She has extensive experience in urban and regional environmental planning and policy and climate change adaptation capacity building. Her research brings together a range of disciplines and fields relevant to managing health challenges into the future (urban planning, environmental management, resilience development, and a range of professional communities of practice) and she would like to share her experiences and lessons from this work. She believes she can help extend the thinking about how we frame regional health challenges in climate change research and praxis response that extends beyond traditional health vulnerability and risk assessment and policy response.
Dr Alexandra Macmillan 
Department of Preventive and Social Medicine, University of Otago
Alexandra’s research is policy-oriented at the nexus of public health, urban planning and climate change. She combines epidemiology with participatory system dynamics modelling to explore the future integrated impacts for health, environmental and social wellbeing, with a particular focus on optimising policies for responding to climate change while optimising human health and social equity. She has used these methods to explore transport and housing policies in New Zealand, the UK and the Netherlands. She is the science lead for Future Streets, an intervention study assessing the integrated health, social and climate impacts of street transformation at a suburb level in Auckland.
She brings to Think Tank Group 4:
Dr Janie Maxwell
Joslin Clinic General Practice, CoHealth
Formal research roles: The Nossal Institute, Melbourne University: primary researcher: Qualitative research: exploring Indian attitudes to pesticides in agriculture and their links to health and the environment; Menzies Institute, Darwin: research assistant: Indigenous health worker barriers and opportunities for work in Arnhem land, Australia; Regular auditing and evidence based practice in clinical medicine. Contributions to think-tanks/projects/papers, on topics including the exploration of cognitive dissonance in action on climate change; the integration of discussion of health co-benefits (to action on climate change) into the general practice consultation; consensus for action on chronic diseases and climate, university leaders think tank. Teaching: In MPH subject: Environmental Challenges and Global Health, Melbourne University 2014; Representing Doctors for the Environment Australia for various community and medical audiences: Climate and Health 2011-2014
As a clinician, Janie has learnt to work through complex problems and systems, identifying gaps in knowledge and avenues for action, often with incomplete information and uncertainty. She has excellent communication skills to relay science and difficult problems as well as navigate psychological emotional and cognitive aspects of climate and health communication. She brings insights into health messaging, the political context, and the realities of the patient experience. Her extensive work in the NGO, corporate, political and academic sectors has offered insight into various opportunities to create traction on these issues. Her work on committees, as a clinician in multidisciplinary teams, as an educator and as a facilitator has consolidated her skills in collaboration, team-work and the development of ideas. She plans to pursue research at the Nossal Institute in 2015 in the area of climate change and health, and is keen to offer research or advocacy of the Think Tank’s findings or objectives, thereby expanding its impact. She hopes to bring not only insight, but also commitment and vision to extend beyond the Think Tank.
Dr Celia McMichael 
Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, La Trobe University
Celia has a background in anthropology and public health. Her research interests/experience focus on population mobility. This includes fieldwork and applied international development work with displaced people in Lima, Peru (1997); resettled Somali refugees (2000–03); internally displaced populations in Angola (2003); tsunami-affected displaced populations in Sri Lanka (2005–06); and newly arrived young people with refugee backgrounds in Melbourne (2007–current). She has a focus on three key research areas: forced migration and settlement; medical anthropology (e.g. water/sanitation and behaviour change); and climate change and migration.
She has a particular interest in the area of climate change and forced migration, and has recently published and presented at seminars and conferences on the topic. Climate change-related migration is anticipated to increase, and it is critically important to examine the relationship between climatic changes, population mobility (and immobility), and both the risks and adaptive potential of migration decisions. One critical area of concern examined in recent publications is the intersection between climate change, migration and population health. She will contribute to this year’s Think Tank an academic understanding of the links between climate change and migration, and their potential impacts on population health; an anthropological background (e.g. focus on local experiences, understanding and responses to climate change risks); a broad relevant basis from which to consider the intersections between climate change and health, including for example previous work on environmental disaster, displacement, health and (the Asian tsunami), and a current NHMRC grant that examines the links between resettled refugees and experiences of environmental disaster in Queensland (the 2011 floods).
Ms Sophie Miller
School of Public Health and Social Work, Queensland University of Technology
Protecting health from natural disasters requires investigation of existing levels of population vulnerability. Socio-economic inequalities vary between and within countries and are linked with poor health outcomes in the most disadvantaged populations compared to least disadvantaged populations. After a disaster, mental health problems are more common than physical health problems. However, the differential socio-economic experiences of extreme weather events on mental health are unknown at individual- and area-levels. Sophie’s research uses subjective and objective-level data to investigate this knowledge gap using the 2011 Brisbane flood case study. She was project manager on an NHMRC longitudinal and multilevel research project in 2007–16.
Her cross-disciplinary research contribution provides knowledge to address population level health disparities during disasters. The impact of her research addresses the following phases outlined in the 2013–2014 State Disaster Management Plan:
Prevention: (1) Urban planning/design. Her research will inform government policy about urban planning/design. In this context, urban planning/design is considered a preventative measure that may help to reduce the flood event or severity.
(2) Prevention/Preparedness/Recovery: Building resilience. Building resilience at the neighbourhood/community level ensures individuals become proactive in their preparation to protect life through awareness of local disaster management plans. By building community resilience, the flood effects on mental health outcomes should reduce alongside reliance on emergency response agencies.
(3) Response: Emergency response. Her research identifies populations at risk of adverse mental health outcomes as a consequence of flooding. This information can help plan targeted emergency response actions so support/relief are provided to those in most need during/after disasters.
Dr Kris Murray 
EcoHealth Alliance
Kris has broad research interests encompassing a range of disciplines (evolutionary ecology, disease ecology, biosecurity, health, ecosystem services, conservation) from which he draws inspiration and develops interdisciplinary research projects. Sitting at the intersection of health (wildlife and human) and conservation, climate change is a central theme in his work and in the mission of his organisation. He has undertaken or has active projects examining the impact of climate on diseases of wildlife, mitigation and adaptation strategies, predictive modelling of potential disease distributions under climate change, and the value of accounting for health in ecosystem-based climate change mitigation strategies (e.g., REDD+).
He brings to the Think Tank broad research, analytical and personal experience, developed during his work in academia (research and teaching), the private sector (industry and consulting) and an independent New York-based health/conservation NGO (research, education and outreach). He has a strong history of effective collaboration in multidisciplinary working groups in disease ecology (e.g. NCEAS, http://www.nceas.ucsb.edu/featured/voyles) and public health (e.g. PREDICT, http://www.usaid.gov/news-information/fact-sheets/emerging-pandemic-thre...).
He is an effective communicator with a demonstrated ability to lead and contribute to multidisciplinary research, including on climate change on health. He is keen to be involved and to to help make a difference on this critical topic, particularly in his home country of Australia where climate change action holds a precarious place in the national conscience.
Dr Suchithra Naish 
School of Public Health and Social Work, and Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation, Queensland University of Technology
Suchithra’s primary research interests are focused on climate change and infectious diseases: risk factor assessment, development of climate-based predictive models and forecasting the disease risk under climate change scenarios. She is focusing on dengue risk transmission among Queenslanders, a high-risk population who face considerable challenges in protecting themselves from dengue infection due to climate change, international travel and urbanisation. Dengue is a leading global public health problem. However, research on the associations between climate change, travel and urbanisation and dengue is lacking. Her PhD thesis investigated the impacts of climatic changes on Barmah Forest virus (mosquito-borne) disease in Queensland.
Her expertise in spatial and temporal modelling of infectious diseases brings the ability to contribute knowledge and skills on applying advanced spatial analytical techniques using geographic information systems. She will contribute spatial skills towards the development of grid databases. As she has developed numerous research collaborations with experts in multi-disciplinary teams both nationally and internationally she will be able to share and expand my networks. As she has attended and presented my research findings in several domestic and international conferences/symposia, she will be able to participate in the working group discussions and help to develop an understanding of the major issues and knowledge gaps in the infectious diseases ecology and epidemiology. Her knowledge about providing recommendations towards the prevention and control of infectious diseases enable her to contribute expertise on developing improved public health interventions.
Dr Uday Bhaskar Nidumolu 
Agricultural Systems Programme, Ecosystems Sciences Division, CSIRO
Uday is an applied science researcher with an overarching interest to translate complex science in a way that the stakeholders of the research make the best use of. He has worked in the area of climate applications for more than seven years. The key area of interest is assessing and managing climate risk by investigating how climate variability and change impact on primary productivity (agriculture, horticulture, dairy). The results of these investigations are then translated in forms that stakeholders for whom this research is undertaken make the best use in their responses to manage climate risk.
He has worked in the area of assessing and managing climate risk for primary production at three time scales – short-term weather, seasonal climate forecasts and long-term climate change – using multi and cross-disciplinary approaches. Engaging farmers and policy makers on climate change impacts on food security is one of his research priorities. he has examined impacts of heat stress on dairy cattle health and impacts on productivity both using historical trends and future scenarios under a changing climate. He will bring to the Think Tank practical ways to unpack the complexity of ‘thinking about climate futures’ into the discussions on climate change that are likely to affect health, food security, livelihoods in different social and economic settings.
Dr Tobin Northfield 
School of Marine and Tropical Biology, James Cook University
Tobin combine mathematical and statistical models with experimental research to evaluate the ways climate change alters ecological communities and, in turn, ecosystem services. He has used theoretical models to show that coevolution between species can either exaggerate or mitigate the effects of climate change on each species, depending on the type of species interactions. He has conducted experiments to demonstrate that plant traits which reduce drought susceptibility can lead to unexpected reductions in the benefits of predator diversity on pest control, leading to increased pest outbreaks. His research has been highlighted by commentaries in Science and Nature.
Climate change can directly affect human health (for example, temperature fluctuations affect heat-related deaths) and produce indirect effects mediated by impacts on ecological communities and the ecosystem services they provide. Ecosystem services range from natural pest control to reduction in atopic sensitisation that results in allergies. Predicting these indirect effects, however, is exceedingly difficult, because they depend on complex species interactions. Tobin aims to gain a general understanding of the direct and indirect effects of climate change through theoretical models, while using experiments to keep theory firmly grounded in empirical data. He can contribute to the Think Tank by identifying ways species interactions mediate the effects of climate change on human health. He enjoys cross-disciplinary collaborations and use my mathematical, statistical, and communication skills to contribute to disciplines outside his research focus.
Dr Elvira Poloczanska 
Marine and Atmospheric Research, CSIRO
Elvira’s research interests focus on the observed and projected impacts of climate variability and climate change on species and communities at both global and Australian scales, and the identification potential adaptation pathways. She collaborates with colleagues working with natural and managed systems, built environments, social science, environmental health and economics to deliver research outputs regarding adaptation to climate change of relevance to decision and policy makers. Her research strives to understand the influence of physical and climate processes on biodiversity and ecological processes across varying spatial and temporal scales and how these may alter in the future.
She brings a specialised ecological biophysical and chemical knowledge of global climate change issues of coastal-marine socio-ecological systems to the Think Tank. She can contribute in the intersection among the expected bio-system changes (extinctions, movements, pests) and the expected diseases /health dynamics, from the perspective vulnerability and risk assessments for species and ecosystem assets and the identification of adaptation/mitigation approaches. She is involved in the processes by which extreme climatic events influence human-dominated and natural ecosystems.
Associate Professor Dean Rickles
History and Philosophy of Science, University of Sydney
Dean’s primary research area is quantum gravity (in which he holds a Future Fellowship, and previously held an ARF), but he has strong interests in complex systems theory (especially applied to social systems, such as financial systems and epidemiology). He worked on a project for the Canadian Institute of Health Science in which he studied the application of complexity ideas to large health interventions, which involved an examination of causality and prediction. He also teaches a course which focuses on issues of modelling, simulation, and prediction in climate modelling.
He has experience working on complex systems and complex (large-scale) interventions in the public health (broadly construed) context, as well as other areas relevant to the climate change case (including risk in the context of financial systems). Since this work was carried out with a specific focus on the ability to make predictions and assess the validity of causal inferences given interventions, this provides an ideal background to investigate the risks of climate change, and the challenges in designing and evaluating interventions to mitigate such risks. The framework provided by studying complex systems theory (and causality therein) allows for what he thinks is the correct way to think about risk, the distribution of risk, and unintended consequences (via the network structure of complex systems).
Associate Professor Anne Roiko
School of Medicine, Griffith University
Anne’s current research interests cover the assessment of water-related health risks, particularly in relation to climate change, climate change adaptation and the transfer of risk-based evidence into policy. She has relevant experience in evaluating research on the health impacts of climate change. For a 2011 report titled ‘iClimate’, commissioned by the National Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility, she was the team member responsible for evaluating and synthesising evidence of observed and projected impacts of climate change on human health and well-being. This report was used to inform the preparation of the Australasian chapter of the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report.
She has worked at the research/policy nexus in this area of climate change and health. Her current research on characterising water-related health risks that are exacerbated by climate change (especially extreme events) is well-aligned to two of the key areas being considered (in Groups one and three). She will be able to contribute to discussions about new types of research and innovative research methods that can be used to explore alternative scenarios and opportunities for risk mitigation, as she has recent experience with novel systems-based research methods such as quantitative microbial risk assessment and Bayesian belief network modelling.
Dr Carly Rosewarne 
Sustainable Agriculture Flagship, CSIRO
Carly is a microbiologist with interests in ecology and bioinformatics. During her Honours project she developed new techniques to track strains of Salmonella associated with food poisoning outbreaks. During her PhD she characterised the spread of antibiotic resistance genes in freshwater ecosystems. She is the principal investigator on a project within the National Livestock Methane Program, focused on characterising methane-producing microbes in ruminants using genomic technologies. She is the current Fulbright Professional Scholar in Climate Change and Clean Energy, which will allow her to visit the Joint Genome Institute in 2015 to further her current work on methanogen genomics.
Her background in microbial ecology and experience in bioinformatics is relevant to discussions about how we can quantify the risks associated with global warming on the emergence and spread of infectious diseases. Recent technological advances provide us with the ability to track outbreaks using rapid techniques, while next generation sequencing approaches can help us to understand how the genetic potential of microbes allows them to survive and adapt in a changing environment. In order to harness these technologies we need to support strategic science initiatives in key areas, with a particular focus on developing appropriate diagnostic tools for pathogens of interest. Development of centralised data repositories is one method that may help policymakers gain access to the latest information, helping to ensure accurate and relevant scientific evidence is included in decision-making processes.
Dr Claudia Vickers 
Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, University of Queensland
Claudia’s research interests cover several areas including basic biology of isoprenoid (terpenoids/terpenes), industrial production of isoprenoids, and carbohydrate metabolism in microbes. The isoprenoid group includes many products with industrial applications, including agricultural chemicals, pharmaceuticals, flavours and fragrances, fuels and rubbers. Her diverse research areas are linked though understanding fundamental biology and applying this understanding to industrial production of natural compounds. Specifically, she is interested in using biology to replace current industrial practices (largely based on finite petrochemical resources) with sustainable, environmentally friendly approaches. To this end, she uses the tools of systems and synthetic biology for metabolic engineering of organisms.
Her primary contribution will be in the Food Supplies area. Her experiences in both plant molecular biology and in microbial metabolic engineering are relevant. In the plant area, she can talk about how plant breeding and genetic modification can be used to develop new varieties that tolerate the direct and indirect effects of climate change. She can also discuss how we can re-engineer microorganisms to produce agricultural chemicals that can improve food production. These processes can help reduce anthropogenic drivers of climate change by decreasing use of fossil resources. She can discuss what the limitations are on these technologies (including socio-political factors), and what the required timescales are. Finally, she has a special interest (and plenty of experience) in science communication, so she can also help develop methods to disseminate our findings to the broader community.
Dr Elvina Viennet 
National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health, College of Medicine, Biology and Environment, Australian National University
Elvina completed a PhD degree in medical and veterinary entomology, epidemiology and bio-ecology in 2012. As a trained epidemiologist and entomologist, she has experience in the ecology of vectors, their control, surveillance and role in the transmission of infectious diseases. Although particularly focused on vector-borne diseases, she is interested in understanding how climate change and associated environmental changes can influence disease transmission and public health. Her extensive experience in multifactorial diseases highlights her ability to work across disciplines. Her current project focuses on identifying the drivers of dengue transmission and predicting the risk of dengue due to future climate change.
She is currently writing two extensive reviews. Through the first, on public health challenges of dengue under climate change in Australia, she presents the current public health responses in place in Australia, and identifies various challenges. In the second, on climate-based models applied to dengue transmission, she presents various methods to identify and predict risks of infectious diseases transmission under climate change, their limitations and the needs. She can share this knowledge, and is also keen to interact with other attendees to discuss the consequences of climate and environmental changes for Public Health, discuss how science could help to reduce the associated risks, reflect on innovative solutions, and critically appraise the potential unintended consequences of risk reduction through time and space, at a community and society level.
Dr Sarah Ann Wheeler 
Centre for Regulation and Market Analysis, School of Commerce, University of South Australia
Sarah is a natural resource economist whose research has focused on farmer behaviour in the face of water scarcity and the need for adaptation in the Murray-Darling Basin. She has written two books, 30 refereed journal papers (57% in ERA A/A* ranked journals), 21 book chapters and 12 other peer-reviewed publications. She is an associate editor of the Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, and a guest editor at Agricultural Water Management. She has a Google h-index of 12, and an i10-index of 14.
She is about to start a project studying the association between farmer suicide and mental health with climate outcomes in the Murray-Darling Basin. There is evidence to suggest that increased climate stress results in adverse mental health outcomes for rural community members, particularly depressive and anxiety disorders and, in extreme cases, suicide. She will be able to contribute to the workshop through her in-depth knowledge about farmer adaptation, and its relationship with climate stressors. She has published widely on this topic. Given the future risk of water scarcity, farmers around the world will need to plan for greater farm-level adaptation to reduce the risk of water shortages. Adaptations are adjustments in human–environmental systems in response to observed or expected climate changes and their impact. In particular the project will look at the relationship between farmer adaptation, climate and mental stress/suicide since the 1990s in the Murray-Darling Basin .
Dr Craig Williams
Division of Health Sciences, University of South Australia
Craig heads the Mosquitoes and Public Health Research Group at the University of South Australia’s Sansom Institute for Health Research. The focus of his research group is communication of mosquito-borne disease risk information to government, health authorities and local council workers. His other research interests include behavioural ecology and the potential impacts of climate change on ecosystems. Current research concerns the forecasting of mosquito-borne diseases in future climates. He has published 64 peer-reviewed articles (1200 citations, h-index 18). He won the 2005 IgNobel Prize in Biology and was the 2007 Young Scientist of the Year for SA.
He researches climate change impacts on ecosystems, particularly vector-borne disease transmission. Through his training in zoology and ecology, and his research with vector-borne diseases, he will bring a strong biological perspective to Think Tank discussions. His leadership roles in the university (as Dean Research Education) and outside it (as President of the Royal Society of SA) allow him to bring a pragmatism and understanding of governance and policy structures to discussions. He is currently editing a scientific volume about the impacts of climate change on South Australia, and was the convener of a symposium on that topic in 2013. Through that work he has a broad appreciation of the impacts of climate change on landscapes, organisms, and human health.
Dr Jason Woodhouse 
School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales
Jason’s research examines interactions between abiotic and biotic components contributing to the formation of toxic cyanobacterial blooms within freshwater ecosystems. This combines aspects of civil engineering, microbial ecology and molecular biology to examine how the genomic capacity of microorganisms manifests physiologically in critical water supplies under varying climatic conditions. He received a PhD from the University of NSW, where he developed novel minimally invasive methods for evaluating metabolic diversity within many of Australia’s unique and vulnerable ecosystems. He has presented at various international conferences and published three papers in international journals.
His research covers several key areas that are critical for forming a complete appreciation for the impact of human activities on the environment, including climatic impacts. Expertise in the broad area of microbial ecology is well placed to inform how climate change and other anthropogenic influences alter the environment, as microorganisms are often the first life forms to manifest changes under these conditions. His expertise on toxic cyanobacteria within freshwater environments is critical for ensuring we can continue to provide adequate supplies of drinking water to communities around the world. Policymakers often overlook these emerging problems, and his presence will aid in highlighting the increasing risk to water quality and subsequently food security that these processes form.
Dr Caitlin Wyrwoll 
School of Anatomy, Physiology and Human Biology, University of Western Australia
Caitlin researches how perturbations in placental and fetal development have long-term ramifications for subsequent adult health. With thermal physiologist Shane Maloney, she is commencing a collaboration modelling heat stress in a rodent model of pregnancy to assess how this affects maternal physiology, placental function and fetal growth and development. Optimal thermoregulation in pregnancy is critical for both maternal and fetal health outcomes. They aim to identify the underlying mechanisms of how heat stress perturbs maternal, placental and fetal physiology and thus propose potential interventions to mitigate adverse outcomes.
The higher levels of metabolic heat generated in the pregnant state must be exchanged with the external environment. The state of the mother is critical for the fetus because the mother is the heat sink for fetal heat. When heat exchange is compromised, there are permanent effects on offspring growth, behaviour and metabolism. She brings a perspective on the importance of regulating optimal maternal heat exchange for both maternal and fetal health outcomes. This will be a critical issue in developing countries where prenatal and postnatal outcomes are already poor; heat stress associated with climate change will exacerbate these poor outcomes. It is critical to develop strategies to mitigate the adverse effects of heat stress during pregnancy, and this will be difficult to do when the underlying mechanisms are not understood. She will highlight the gaps in current knowledge and the research required to move the field forward.
Dr Weiwei (Vivian) Yu 
School of Public Health and Social Work, Queensland University of Technology
Vivian is working on an NHMRC project entitled ‘Projecting the impact of future climate change on Ross River virus’. A spatio-temporal modelling technique was used at statistical local area level from 2001 to 2011 in Queensland, Australia. She has extensive experience in managing multidisciplinary projects and has research expertise in epidemiology, biostatistics, and environmental health. In the past three years, she has published 23 articles in international journals (11 as first/senior author). She currently supervises three PhD and one research Masters students as associate supervisor.
The outcomes of the project will inform the attendees of how future climate will change in Queensland and what the spatial heterogeneity in different levels is. Future risks of Ross River virus will be projected up to 2100 and the spatial differences of disease distribution will be demonstrated in the maps. The results have applications to guide the policymakers on specific areas vulnerable to climate change in the future.
Dr Ying Zhang 
School of Public Health / China Studies Centre, University of Sydney
Ying is an epidemiologist with more than ten year’s research and teaching experience on climate change and population health. Her PhD focused on the impact of climate change on vector-borne and food-borne diseases, with pioneering studies conducted in Australia and China. Her current research with an NHMRC Early Career Fellowship is focusing on health impacts from extreme heat events, particularly to identify venerable populations for a better adaptation to climate change. She has a strong international profile of working on climate change adaptation in both developed and developing settings.
She has experience in multidisciplinary research and national/international collaborations with stakeholders in climate change and population health. She will be able to contribute to the Think Tank in the following areas:
© 2024 Australian Academy of Science
