Somerville Tutor and Fellow in Biological Sciences, Professor Alex Rogers, has won the Marsh Award for Marine and Freshwater Conservation.
The Award is run in partnership with the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) and the Marsh Christian Trust, and recognises an individual for his or her contributions of fundamental science to the conservation of marine and freshwater ecosystems.
A ZSL judging panel, consisting of experts in the field, offer their knowledge and expertise to select an Award winner. Members of the panel were unanimous in their decision to give this year’s award to Professor Rogers.
ZSL is an international scientific, conservation and educational charity whose mission is to promote and achieve the worldwide conservation of animals and their habitats. It recognises outstanding achievements in zoological research and conservation through its annual presentation of awards.
Last month, Professor Rogers was awarded a grant from the Natural Environment Research Council of over £438,000 to fund a new research project investigating the influence of population connectivity on depth-dependent diversity in the deep-sea.
The research has practical implications for the sustainable management of the marine environment. Governments all over the world are setting up networks of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) to try to help protect and sustain the marine environment, an important consideration will be to ensure that the populations that live within the MPAs are not artificially isolated from each other and remain connected.