Hugh Possingham
University of Queensland
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Primary Section: 63, Environmental Sciences and Ecology Secondary Section: 32, Applied Mathematical Sciences Membership Type:
International Member
(elected 2016)
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Biosketch
Hugh's scientific career started at the University of Adelaide where he completed his Bachelor's degree with Honours in Applied Mathematics in 1984, which was followed in 1987 by a doctorate in Ecological Modelling as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University. Aged 32 he became the inaugural Chair and Professor of Environmental Science and Management at The University of Adelaide. He joined the University of Queensland in 2000 as Chair in the Department of Mathematics and Biological Sciences where he has led several research centres and held Australian Research Council Professorial, Laureate and Federation Fellowships. He was Director of the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Environmental Decisions, as well as the Australian Government's Threatened Species Recovery Hub. In 2016 he became the Chief Scientist at The Nature Conservancy, a global conservation organisation with 400 scientists and 4000 staff, that has protected more than 40 million hectares of land and thousands of kilometres of rivers worldwide. His combination of expertise in mathematics and ecology has enabled Professor Possingham to undertake conservation initiatives that integrate spatial planning and economic factors. This is demonstrated through his co-development of the Marxan(external link) software for conservation planning, which has been described as “the most significant contribution to conservation biology to emerge from Australia's research community.” He has co-authored more than 660 peer-reviewed papers, with more than 35 in the world’s top two scientific journals Science and Nature. Professor Possingham was elected(external link) a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science in 2005. In 2016, Professor Possingham was elected a Foreign Associate of the US National Academy of Sciences. Professor Possingham will work to ensure young Queenslanders are inspired to consider a career in science and to encourage community interest in science and advocacy for science. As Queensland Chief Scientist he will advise government on scientific matters.
Research Interests
Hugh Possingham and his collaborators are interested in formulating and solving problems in nature conservation. They have developed software and tools to construct zoning plans for the land and the sea that seek to meet the needs of both nature and people. Their software is used in over 150 countries to design protected area systems. The group uses a variety of ideas from economics and applied mathematics to prioritize the allocation of funds or choose between broad strategies - such as restore or protect habitat. More recently they have become interested in the question of how much we should invest in monitoring and knowledge gain relative to taking more conservation action - value of information theory.
