JAMES COOK UNIVERSITY
Research Field: Marine Ecology and evolutionary physiology
On the Great Barrier Reef and worldwide, Dr Rummer is tracking athletic capacity in
fish, including sharks and rays, under different conditions, across development and
species, and over generations to determine how climate change and other stressors will
affect the future of marine ecosystems.
She also has a strong interest in exercise-induced stress (e.g., swimming, vertical movements,
buoyancy control) and, from a more applied angle, catch-and-release fishing, including post-release
mortality and sub-lethal physiological/behavioural modifications. In the field, geographic gradients
are used (e.g., temperature gradients along the length of the Great Barrier Reef) and local extreme
environments (e.g., low oxygen, high CO² microhabitats within a mangrove or coral reef and even
underwater volcanic CO² seeps) as analogues for future change.
In the laboratory, her research integrates conventional and state-of-the-art physiological,
biochemical, and molecular techniques to gain insight into the various responses that
may be key to adaptation. These areas are not only vital to conservation of coral reef
and marine ecosystems but are also important contributions to basic science.