Marcus Butler
10 May 2016: The health of Australian waterways will be closely monitored through a better understanding of the organisms living in them, thanks to a University of Canberra research project awarded new funding from the Australian Research Council (ARC).
The University's Institute for Applied Ecology (IAE) project, led by assistant professor in water science Dr Ben Kefford, received $340,000 in ARC Linkage Project funding.
Dr Kefford said the project will focus on which species of invertebrates, including insects and other aquatic life, live in the Australian waterways and what environmental factors affect their populations in these water bodies.
"Information on these species' traits will allow us to determine from their presence or absence, whether the long-term health of a waterway is ok and where it is not ok, what factors are likely causing the degradation?"
"Current testing methods show the health of a waterway but do not indicate what caused any degradation observed," Dr Kefford said.
"If we know that certain species can't tolerate low oxygen water, and we no longer find them in what otherwise would be a healthy looking river, we can theorise that oxygen levels have been a problem in the recent past," he said.
The project draws on current work at the University's IAE and the University of Melbourne, in which a DNA library barcode system is being built, to allow researchers to rapidly determine the organisms which are present in a water sample.
Dr Kefford said the barcode system will speed up the entire testing process, given that a DNA test will reveal the identity of a species, rather than having to identify each under a microscope.
"It's much quicker to be able to decode the DNA mix in a sample and then, with computer assistance, match up segments of that DNA to samples which are on record to identify the invertebrates present," he said.
"By combining these two processes, identifying the traits of species and having access to a DNA library barcode system, we can provide results on the health and diversity of waterways and their ecosystems with a very quick turnaround."
Among the IAE scientists working with Dr Kefford on the project are University of Canberra Centenary Research Professor Ralph Mac Nally, research fellow Dr Sue Nichols and Dr Bruce Chessman, as well as colleagues from the Universities of Queensland and Melbourne.
Environmental management agencies in all Australian States and Territories will also contribute to the project, including personnel from the Environment Protection Authorities of South Australia and Victoria, and the Queensland Department of Environment and Resource Management as partner investigators.
University of Canberra's professor of affective computing Roland Goecke and professor of information systems John Campbell will participate in an ARC linkage project to develop an automated suicide risk detection system which can be used to prevent railway suicide.
The project which is led by the Australian National University received $450,000 funding to detect, report and prevent suicide on Australian railways and overseas.
