Researcher wins fellowship for tropical cyclone study

Southern Cross University coastal geomorphologist Dr Anja Scheffers has been named one of 200 Future Fellows, a prestigious national award for outstanding researchers.

Dr Scheffers, a senior lecturer in the School of Environmental Science and Management, has received the Australian Research Council Future Fellowship, worth more than $700,000 over four years, for a project which will look at tropical cyclone activity, dating back 7000 years in Western Australia.

The Future Fellows, announced today (September 9) by the Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research, Senator Kim Carr, have been awarded to 200 outstanding national and international mid-career researchers.

“The government established the ARC Future Fellowships scheme to address the gap in opportunities for mid-career researchers in Australia, which forced many of our talented researchers to search for work overseas,” Senator Carr said.

“This first round of the ARC Future Fellowships scheme will see 159 of our best and brightest continue their world-class research at home, boosted by the four-year, fellowship, worth up-to $740,000.”

Another 41 Future Fellows will come to Australia to pursue their research - 19 Australians lured home by the scheme and 22 international researchers bringing their talents to our shores.

“All 200 Future Fellows will conduct research into areas of national priority and will advance Australia’s international research and innovation standing,” Senator Carr said.

Dr Scheffers has spent the last seven years looking at the long-term history (over 7000 years) of natural hazards including cyclones, tsunamis, coastal erosion and storm inundation and the implications for coastal management and government policies. Originally from Germany, she has carried out research projects in places including Western Australia, Patagonia, Portugal, Greece, Thailand, Ireland and the Caribbean.

The Fellowship will fund a new project titled ‘Unravelling Western Australia’s Stormy Past – a precisely-dated sediment record of cyclones over the past 7000 years’.

“Tropical cyclones are among the most deadly and destructive natural hazards. But the impact of global climate change on tropical cyclone activity remains uncertain and highly controversial on the basis that the instrumental record is too short and unreliable to reveal trends in intense tropical cyclone activity,” Dr Scheffers said.

“I will be looking at storm-induced deposits in coastal sediment in Western Australia. These sediments can provide an environmental historical record of tropical cyclone activity for several thousand years. By reconstructing this history we can better assess storm and cyclone risk under changing future climates.”

Professor Neal Ryan, Pro Vice Chancellor Research at Southern Cross University, said the Fellowship award was an outstanding achievement.

“We are delighted that one of our researchers is among the first Future Fellows,” Professor Ryan said. “This is a highly prestigious award which recognises the world-class research being done by Dr Scheffers.”

Photo: Dr Anja Scheffers on the island of Bonaire in the southern Caribbean, one of the locations where she has studied past storm activity.