DR. EMMA CAMP is a coral biologist and marine biogeochemist with research interests in the role marginal reef environments (i.e., mangrove habitats) can play in understanding the impact of future climate change on coral reefs. She is the Deputy Team Leader of the Future Reefs Program within the Climate Change Cluster at the University of Technology Sydney, an Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Early Career Research Award Recipient (DECRA) & Chancellors Postdoctoral Research Fellow. Emma co-founded the Coral Nurture Program, a new approach and collaboration between researchers and tourism operators on the Great Barrier Reef to conserve reef sites by “coral gardening” – outplanting new coral fragments or larval pieces onto depleted reef sites.

Alongside her pioneering research, Emma is passionate about championing the introduction and retention of women and girls in STEM – Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. She holds an Honorary Position with the United Nations as part of the second class of Young Leaders for the Sustainable Development Goals, a platform where she can work with the UN to help catalyze the achievement of the SDG Goals. In 2020 she was named an inaugural Australian Academy of Sciences STEM Women’s Gamechanger and Max Day Environmental Science Fellowship Award, and made Time Magazine’s 2020 Next Generation Leaders list. She is a Rolex Award For Enterprise Laureate, a L’Oréal UNESCO Women in Science Fellow and a National Geographic Explorer. She cares deeply about communicating research to engage society to become part of the solutions required to ensure a perpetual Earth.

Born: 1987

Hometown: Essex, England Education: Ph.D. in Marine Biology Occupation: Marine biologist, corals expert

Expeditions: The Greater Barrier Reef, New Caledonia, the Seychelles, Indonesia, Brazil, the Carman Islands

Favorite Place To Be: On the reef

Best Discovery: Extreme corals living in mangrove lagoons where seawater conditions are currently more hostile than we are expecting for coral reefs in the year 2100

Favorite Items In The Field: Underwater headlamp, drone (to check for crocodiles), carabiners

Personal Heroes: Sylvia Earle and my parents

Hobbies: Basketball, running, underwater photography

Website: https://emmafcamp.com/

Advice: You can and you will