I began my tertiary education in Tasmania with a Bachelor degree in aquaculture, then did my honours degree on abalone digestive physiology. Following this, still at the University of Tasmania (UTas), I embarked on a PhD to investigate the environmental requirements of abalone. In this PhD I examined growth and survival of greenlip and blacklip abalone, but also added to some work from my honours in the areas of respiratory physiology and histopathology. After receiving my PhD, I took a post doctoral fellowship, still at UTas, extending the work of my PhD. I did a second postdoc at UTas on the pathophysiology of amoebic gill disease before accepting the position of Lecturer at Flinders University in late 2004. Since then, I have developed my research interests in the areas of aquaculture, aquatic animal health, abalone and kingfish culture.

My research is centred on aquatic animal health, and its impact for aquaculture. I have conducted research into abalone health and physiology under adverse environmental conditions. This included examining the respiratory and osmoregulatory physiology of these animals. Other research projects into bacterial disease occurrence, treatment and prevention for abalone led to work on respiratory physiology of Atlantic salmon affected by amoebic gill disease. This work included examination of respiration rates, blood gas content and oxygen loading of affected fish, and the impacts of treatment on the fish. Current research interests include physiology of disease-affected aquatic animals, new species development for aquaculture, physiology of aquatic animals in live transport, environmental, immunological response to DNA vaccination, toxicology of aquatic animals, diagnostic test development, product development for aquaculture, understanding the role of signalling proteins in abalone spawning and environmental tolerance of rescued species for reintroduction to the wild. I have a current collaboration with CSIRO in the area of disease management and proteomics.