Biological foundations of life

This research aims to prevent fungi from causing problems to humans and to find new treatment and management strategies, while addressing also the potential fungi have to enhance our lives.

Using an array of genetic and genomic approaches, the research in the lab aims to understand how fungi infect humans, get around the immune defence systems and cause disease.

Combining experimental and computational approaches to study the effect of environmental variation and stress on natural population.

Behavioural Ecology and Macroevolution studies of behavioural ecology from a broad evolutionary perspective. We use comparative analyses and field and lab experiments to answer different questions about nature.

Reconstructing branches of the plant and fungal trees of life, investigating the evolution of morphological and ecological traits, and quantifying and describing new taxa.

BRITE supports collaborative efforts to improve our teaching and learning. We enable research on teaching and learning innovations and the evaluation of teaching practices.

The research focus in the Climatic and Metabolic Ecology Lab is on how physical constraints on heat, water and nutritional balances limit the behaviour, distribution and abundance of species.

Understanding how complex patterns of gene expression are generated and maintained during cell-type specification and differentiation in multicellular organisms.

Our lab investigates improving outcomes of human and animal ART, identifying critical pathways in early embryo development and metabolism, and determining the effects of endocrine and environmental factors on fertility and offspring health.

We use genetics, chemical biology, molecular biology, biochemistry and systems analyses to understand mechanisms that control circadian rhythms with a particular focus on metabolic signalling and nutrient balance.

Understanding the genetic networks that co-ordinate the generation of different types of neurons in the central nervous system of vertebrates.

MACSYS generates mathematics and computational technologies to make biology predictive, tackles fundamental biological problems and has established a world-leading research and biotechnology translation environment.

Research focuses on community ecology and the conservation of plant and insect communities in human altered environments. We work in tropical and subtropical rain forests and Mediterranean, temperate and tropical grasslands on a diversity of plant and insect species.

Our group is interested in malaria and symbiosis - two topics that seem somewhat far apart but are in fact strangely interconnected. Our research has led to a paradigm shift in understanding the malaria parasite.

Researching the causes and consequences of variability in mating systems, particularly the relative importance of sexual and natural selection, the role of visual and acoustic signals, and the way in which cooperation and conflict interact in complex social groups.

Research in the lab broadly addresses questions on species interactions and adaptation. We also continue longstanding interests to understand plant growth, defense, and other functional traits as they change under biotic and abiotic stress.

Evolution, development and reproduction. The Pask Lab explores fundamental questions in evolution, development and reproduction using comparative and genomic approaches.

We study the phylogeny, classification and biogeography of Australasian plants, including eucalypts, acacias, Eremophila, Nicotiana, Dianella, Grevillea, the family Rutaceae, ferns and bryophytes.

Researching the impacts of, and adaptations to, natural and human-induced flow variability, fishery activity, and environmental change.

Focusing on the community ecology of plants and pollinators in a changing climate. We use experiments, long-term and historical data, and observations of natural variation to understand how climate change is affecting plants, pollinators, and their interactions.

The interests of the Shai Meiri Lab lie at an intersection of evolutionary biology, biogeography, conservation biology, macroecology and zoology.

Combining evolutionary genomics, functional genetics, and cutting-edge genetic engineering to understand how arthropods evolve resistance to chemical insecticides — and to build the next generation of precise, species-specific alternatives.

The Stuart-Fox Lab studies the biology of light and colour, tackling questions at different scales of biological organisation – from optical properties at the nanometre scale to global patterns of colour diversity.

Led by Michelle Watt, the Adrienne Clarke Professorial Chair of Botany, making discoveries about the root systems of plants, and applying those discoveries to engineering plant systems that sustain healthy life on Earth and in future in space.

Researching the role of genomic parasites in generating intragenomic conflict, predominantly working with insects, by elucidating the consequences for mating systems, the evolution of new traits, the creation of biological novelty, and the survival of populations.