Caroline Petus

Caroline was born and grew up in the south-western coast of France. She completed a MSc in Environment, Littoral and Marine Oceanography in 2006 and a PhD in oceanography with a specialty in remote sensing in 2009, both at the University of Bordeaux (France). Her PhD focused on developing methods to monitor the quality of coastal waters in the south Bay of Biscay (France) through the integration of remote sensing and in-situ data. Previous experiences include wetland sustainability monitoring in outback Australia, coastal upwelling monitoring in Colombia (South America), and the management of regional in-situ and spatial datasets. Caroline moved to Australia in 2010 and has been working with the Centre for Tropical Water & Aquatic Ecosystem Research (TropWATER) at James Cook University, Australia since 2012.

Research and monitoring programs that Caroline has been an investigator for since 2012 include:

Principal Investigator:

• Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority - Contract Research “Reef Rescue marine Monitoring Program - Assessment of Terrestrial Run-off entering the Reef” PIs: Waterhouse, J., Petus, C., Tracey, D., and Lewis, S. funding: 4,340,656 over 11 years

Investigator:

• Department of the Environment - National Environmental Research Program - Tropical Ecosystems Hub - Project 4.4 'Hazard assessment for water quality threats to Torres Strait marine waters, ecosystems and public health' - PI: Brodie, J.
• Department of the Environment - National Environmental Research Program - Tropical Ecosystems Hub - Project 'Vulnerability of seagrass habitats in the Great Barrier Reef to flood plume impacts: light, nutrients, salinity' - PI: Collier, C.
• Department of the Environment - National Environmental Research Program - Tropical Ecosystems Hub - Compilation of GBR Water Quality Data and Analyses as Part of NERP TE Project 9.1 - PI: Devlin, M., funding: $15,000
• Cape York NRM, NQ Dry Tropics and the Fitzroy Basin Association - 'Mapping uncertainty in chlorophyll a assessments from remote sensing in the Great Barrier Reef'. Outcomes of a joint project for the Cape York, Burdekin and Fitzroy Water Quality Improvement Plans, 2015, PIs: Brodie, J. and Waterhouse, J.,
• Queensland Department of Environment and Heritage Protection - 'Assessment of the relative risk of degraded water quality to ecosystems of the Great Barrier Reef' - PIs: Brodie, J. and Waterhouse, J.
• South Cape York Catchments - Contract Research “Cape York WQIP Update: Supporting Studies”- PIs: Brodie, J. and Waterhouse, J., funding: $59,000
• NQ Dry Tropics - Contract Research “Burdekin WQIP Update: Supporting Studies” - PIs: Brodie, J. and Waterhouse, J., funding: $109,000
• Fitzroy Basin Association (Gladstone Healthy Harbour Partnership) - Contract Research “Fitzroy WQIP: Supporting studies” - PIs: Brodie, J. and Waterhouse, J., funding: $71,000
• North Queensland Bulk Ports Corporation - Contract Research “Mackay & Hay Point Marine Water Quality Monitoring” - PIs: Waltham, N. and Rasheed, M., funding: $492,260 over 2 year
• Gladstone Fishing Fund - Contract Research “Using satellite maps to document the extent of sediment plumes associated with dredging activity in Gladstone Port's western basin”. PI: Devlin, M., funding: $10000
• DSITIA - Accelerate Partnerships “Towards Solving COTS on the GBR through Integrated Pest Management” - PIs: Anthony, K., MacNeil,A., Sweatman, H., Archer, A., Mumby, P., McDonald-Madden, E., Hock, K., Devlin, M., Hoey, J and Beeden, R., $60,000 over 2 years (administered by AIMS)
• Australian Institute of Marine Science - Contract Research “Compilation of GBR Water Quality Data and Analyses” - PI: Devlin, M., funding: $30,000

Previous national and international projects (selection):

• Allocating Water and Maintaining Springs in the Great Artesian Basin Project - Australian National Water Initiative and South Australian Government agencies.
• Littoral Ocean River Euskadi Aquitaine (LOREA) and Operational Observation of suspended sediments in EUSKADI-AQUITANIA (OOSEAA) projects - French/Spain collaboration
• Caracterización de la zona costera del Departamento de la Guajira; una aproximación para su manejo integrado (montoring of the Guajira upwelling) - French/Colombia collaboration

Caroline's broad research interests focus on the application and analysis of spatial, remote sensing and in-situ data in environmental sciences and natural resource monitoring and management. She focuses more particularly on the aquatic ecosystems, including the wetland, estuarine, coastal and offshore ecosystems. She specialises in the monitoring of coastal water quality, the mapping of land-sourced contaminants transport within river plume waters and the evaluation of the susceptibility of coastal to marine key ecosystems to river plume exposure. She is particularly interested in understanding the extent of normal and extreme natural variations in sensitive aquatic environments to better monitor and assess the changes from anthropogenic-driven or climate changes.