Curriculum Vitae for William Dennison

PERSONAL DETAILS

Name: William C. Dennison
Email: dennison@umces.edu

ACADEMIC DETAILS

Ph.D. The University of Chicago
Chicago IL USA 1981-1984 (Biology)

M.S. University of Alaska
Fairbanks AK USA 1978-1979 (Biological Oceanography)

B.A. Western Michigan University
Kalamazoo MI USA 1972-1976 (Biology, Environmental Science)

 

EMPLOYMENT

2002- Vice President for Science Application, University of Maryland Center of Environmental Science
2000 – 2001 Reader, Department of Botany, University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD 4072 Australia
1995 – 1999 Senior Lecturer, Department of Botany, University of Queensland.
1992 – 1994 Lecturer, Department of Botany, University of Queensland.
1987 – 1992 Research Assistant Professor, Horn Point Environmental Laboratory, University of Maryland, Cambridge, MD 21613 USA
1984 – 1987 Coastal Marine Scholar, Marine Sciences Research Center, State University of New York, Stony Brook, NY 11794 USA

 

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

Professor Bill Dennison has spent the last ten years establishing the Moreton Bay Study in Queensland, Australia. During this time he was head of the Marine Botany Group at the University of Queensland, which was instrumental in the development of a wide range of biological indicators (including the d¹⁵N plume mapping technique) for the region. These techniques are now an integral part of the long term ecosystem health monitoring program, covering the catchment, estuaries and bays.


Deputy Chair, Scientific Advisory Group, Southeast Queensland Regional Water Quality Strategy (1996-present)

Chair, Scientific Core Group, Brisbane River & Moreton Bay Wastewater Management Study (1997-present)

Deputy Chair, Scientific Expert Panel, Southeast Queensland Regional Water Quality Strategy (1999-present)

President, Australian Coral Reef Society (1998-2000)

Working Group Chair, National Land & Water Resources Audit Estuaries Component (1998-present)

Theme Leader & Executive Management Committee member, CRC for Coastal Zone, Estuary & Waterway Management (1999-2006)

Convenor, International Peer Review Group, Cockburn Cement Environmental Management Programme, Perth (1995-present)

Member, National Committee for Plant Sciences, Australian Academy of Science, Canberra (1999-present)

Member, Riversymposium Advisory Committee, Third International River Management Symposium, 2000

Co-Chair, Brisbane International Symposium on Ecosystem Health, 2000

Reviewer, Adelaide Coastal Waters Program, ANZECC Water Quality Guidelines, Tuggerah Lakes Management Program, Port Phillip Bay Environmental Study, Chesapeake Bay Program, Florida Bay Environmental Program, (1992-present)

Member, 6 professional scientific societies (National & International)

GRADUATE STUDENT SUPERVISION

PhDs

Ben Longstaff PhD 2003 - Investigations into the light requirements of seagrasses in northeast Australia.

Katherine Chaston PhD 2002 -Sediment Nutrient Bioavailability in a Sub-tropical Catchment Dominated by Agriculture: The Transition from Land to Sea.

Simon Costanzo PhD 2002 - Design and Implementation of Baseline Monitoring Tools and Strategies for Assessing Australian Coastal Waters.

David Haynes PhD 2001 - Pesticide and Heavymetal Concentrations in Great Barrier Reef Sediment, Seagrass and Dugongs (Dugong dugon).

Michele Burford PhD 2000 - Fate and Transformation of Dietary Nitrogen in Penaeid Prawn Aquaculture ponds.

Mark O’Donohue PhD 2000 - Environmental Controls of Primary Productivity, Biological Indicators and Ecosystem Health: A case study in Moreton Bay, Australia.

Adrian Jones PhD 1999 - Environmental Management of Aquaculture Effluent:
Development of Biological Indicators and Biological Filters.

Christine Perry PhD 1997 - Microbial Processes in Seagrass Sediments.

James Udy PhD 1997 - Seagrass and Sediment Nutrients: Growth and Physiological Responses of Seagrasses to Elevated Nutrients in Australia.

Eva Abal PhD 1996 - Light, Nutrient and Water Quality Interactions with the Seagrass Zostera capricorni Aschers.

 

Masters

Mark Crossley MPhil 2002 - The Effects of Water Flow, pH and Nutrition on the Growth of the Native Aquatic Plant, Aponogeton elongatus.

 

Honours/Post graduate diploma

Tracey Saxby BSc (Hons) 2001 - Photosynthetic responses of the coral Montipora digitata to cold temperature stress.

Ian Hewson BSc (Hons) 2000 - Dynamics of Marine Viruses Along Autrophication Gradients in Australian Subtropical Estuaries.

Andrew Watkinson BSc (Hons) 2000 - Ecophysiology of the Marine Cyanobacterium Lyngbya Majuscula (Oscillatoriacea).

Catherine Collier BSc (Hons) 1999 - Internal Nitrogen Cycling in Three Seagrasses:
patterns and process.

Joelle Prange BSc (Hons) 1999 - The Cycling of Trace Metals in Seagrass Environments.

Elizabeth King 1999 - Assessment of Water Quality using Phytoplankton in Two Estuaries (Queensland, Australia).

Graham Webb BEnvSc 1999 - Assessing zooplankton grazing in Moreton Bay by measuring short-term changes in chlorophyll a concentrations.

Chris Roelfsema PgDipMarSci 1999 - Spatial Distribution of Benthic Microalgae on Coral Reefs Determined by Remote Sensing.

Phillip Kay BSc (Hons) 1998 - Phytoplankton Bioassays: Technique Development for Assessing Bioavailability of Sediment Phosphorus in Aquatic Ecosystems.

Sabine Roberts PgDipMarSci 1997 - The Effects of Dugong Grazing on Seagrass Communities in Moreton Bay.

Jane Rogers BSc (Hons) 1997 - Responses of Mangrove Forests to Natural and Experimental Nutrient Gradients in Moreton Bay, Australia

Bernard Dudley BSc (Hons) 1996 - Nitrogen Fixation and the Seagrass Halodule uninervus (Forsk) Aschers.

Scott Lowe BEnvSc 1996 - Estuarine Macrophytes as Nutrient Bioindicators for Tracing Sewage Effluent in the Maroochy River, Queensland.

Simon Costanzo BSc (Hons) 1996 - Marine Macroalgae (Rhodophyta) as a Biological Indicator of Pulsed Nutrients in Oligotrophic Waters.

Rhona McPhee BEnvSc 1995 - Assessing Red Algae Associated with Mangroves as Bioindicators of Nutrient Availability

Ben Longstaff BSc (Hons) 1995 - The Effects of Light Deprivation on the Survival and Recovery of the Seagrass Halophila ovalis.

Adrian Jones BSc (Hons) 1994 - Influence of Nitrogen Source and Availability on Amino Acids, Pigments and Tissue Nitrogen of Gracilaria edulis (Rhodophyta).

Shane Dawson BSc (Hons) 1994 - Effects of Ultraviolet and Photosynthetically Active Radiation on Five Seagrass Species.

Angela Grice BSc (Hons) 1993 - Light Intensity Effects on the Carbon and Nitrogen Stable Isotope Ratios and Tissue Contents of Five Seagrass Species.

Tracey O'Connell BSc (Hons) 1993 - Nutrients in a North Stradbroke Island Mangrove Forest.

Patricia Bowen BSc (Hons) 1993 - Morphological and Genetic Variation in the Seagrass, Zostera capricorni.

Janine Horrocks BSc (Hons) 1992 - Tissue Nutrient Content of Gracilaria spp. (Rhodophyta) and Water Quality of Logan River and Southern Moreton Bay.

 

RESEARCH

Seagrass Ecophysiology

I have been studying seagrass ecophysiology since my Master’s thesis. My investigations have encompassed a wide range of experimental field and laboratory studies. These studies have recently benefited from the high seagrass diversity in Australia, providing a unique comparative approach to each of the ecophysiological investigations. With my PhD and Honours students, I have developed a comprehensive conceptual model that relates seagrass morphology to physiology so that light, nutrient, water motion and grazing effects on seagrasses can be placed into a successional and evolutionary context (Walker et al., 1999). We have also related seagrass responses to sediment biogeochemical processes, interpreted dugong grazing as corals-evolution with selected seagrass species, provided an interpretation of seagrass d¹³C and d¹⁵N values, pioneered photosynthetic assessment of seagrasses using PAM fluorometry, determined effects of ultraviolet light, high and low light regimes, and total light deprivation through in situ and laboratory experiments, developed new techniques for measuring sediment nutrient pools and fluxes relevant to seagrasses, assessed the effects of metals, and using laboratory and in situ ¹⁵N tracer additions to assess uptake, assimilation and translocation.

Ecological Health Assessment

A series of projects beginning with a water quality study in 1992 has led to a program of assessing ecological health of various coastal marine ecosystems. The development of a suite of nutrient bioindicators using marine plants has provided essential tools for assessing ecological health. Phytoplankton productivity responses to nutrient additions are used to delineate nitrogen vs. phosphorus limitation, macroalgal metabolic profiling is used to discern form of nitrogen taken up and amount of ambient dissolved nutrients in a wide variety of locations, seagrass depth range transects are used as a water quality monitoring tool, vegetation isotopic signatures (d¹³C and d¹⁵N) are used to distinguish source of carbon and nitrogen in marine habitats, particularly sewage nitrogen. The creation of conceptual models to encapsulate current understanding of key ecological processes, anthropogenic impact zones, and critical habitats have been used to communicate scientific results and to focus scientific efforts. These assessment tools have been developed and tested in a series of coastal embayment studies culminating in a newly created Ecological Health Monitoring Program in SE Queensland and a national audit of Australian estuaries that has been recently initiated.

Recent research findings

1) Development of underwater Pulse Amplitude Modulated (PAM) fluorometry techniques in collaboration with Walz Scientific (Germany) resulted in the first publications on this revolutionary approach to assess in situ photosynthesis underwater (Ralph et al., 1998; Jones & Dennison, 1998). Walz is now marketing the Diving PAM worldwide, ensuring multiple citations for the seminal work.
2) Discovery of the ubiquitous and productive nature of microscopic algae living in coral reef sediments (benthic microalgae result in the white sands of the Great Barrier Reef being functionally equivalent to a green leaf) has led to two landmark manuscripts submitted (Coral Reefs) describing the field data and development of remote sensing techniques.
3) The application of stable isotope analysis of marine plants has produced maps of sewage nitrogen plumes (d¹⁵N) using spatial statistical analysis and geographic information systems for effective data visualisation which has led to a $150,000,000 annual investment in sewage upgrades in SE Queensland.
4) Identification of a toxic cyanobacteria bloom in SE Queensland affecting thousands of fishermen and swimmers has led to a major toxicological and ecological study. The intense interest in the scientific community has led to invited presentations at national and international meetings (Dennison et al., 1999) and a broad based network of collaborators.

 

MEETINGS / PRESENTATIONS

Scientific conferences (1998-present)

Over 100 presentations at international, national and regional scientific meetings and at various universities and research institutions. Over the past 2 years, my students and I have made contributed and invited presentations at Estuarine Research Federation, American Society for Limnology & Oceanography, International Marine Cyanobacteria Conference, Australian Marine Science Association, Australian Coral Reef Society, Australian Society for Phycology and Aquatic Plants, Australian Society for Plant Physiology, Australian Limnological Society, International Riversymposium.

Public talks (1997-present)

Multiple presentations to various groups including: Australian Marine Conservation Society, Wildlife Preservation Society, Caboolture Integrated Catchment Group, Pumicestone Passage Catchment Group, Moreton Bay Environmental Alliance, Bayside Environmental Network, Logan/Coomera Management Group, Vessel Wash Workshop, General Public Talk-Ipswich & Brisbane, Chapel Hill Environmental Education and Community Centre, Australians for a Just and Civil Society, Launch of Healthy Waterways Campaign, Quandamooka Land & Sea Council, Queensland Commercial Fishermens Organisation

Presentations to government officials (1994-present)

Multiple presentations to various groups including: Brisbane City Council, Redcliffe City Council, Ipswich City Council, Redlands Shire Council, Caboolture Shire Council, Pine Rivers Shire Council, Environmental Protection Agency, Regional & State Assessment Panel-National Heritage Trust, WesROC, Port of Brisbane, Tweed Advisory Council, Steering Committee, Technical Advisory Group, ICAG, State & Federal Minister briefings, Local Mayor briefings, Queensland Fisheries Management Authority

Media Interviews (1993-present)

CBS Sunday (US), Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) radio—“Landline”, “Background Briefing”, ABC television news, Channel 7 news, Channel 9 news, Channel 10 news, Channel 10 “Totally Wild” segments, Channel 7 “Brisbane Extra”, “Brisbane River Special”, ABC “7.30 Report”, Courier Mail, Sunday Mail, Peninsula Post, Gold Coast Bulletin, Wynnum Herald, Southwest News, Bribie Weekly, University News, Redcliffe and Bayside Herald, Techwatch, Downstream, Island and Mainland News, Fraser Coast Chronicle newspaper reports