Professional Experience
Senior Lecturer in Marine Science – University of Gibraltar, Gibraltar. 2021-present.
Research focused on developing methods for annotating of marine imagery, specifically on deep-sea taxa and litter to inform conservation effort. The use of photogrammetry as a monitoring tool to assess coral health.
Associate Research Fellow – University of Plymouth, UK. 2015-present
Co-founded the SMarTaR-ID North Atlantic unified species catalogue to ensure standardisation of species identification. Worked with deep-sea taxonomists to develop identification guides for image annotations.
Director of Marine Consultancy – Galathea Marine Consultants Ltd. – 2015-present.
A consultancy company specialising in analysis of deep-sea imagery using the annotation software BIIGLE 2.0 (>30K images). Development of protocols for image analysis. Implementation of novel Largo tool for assigning taxa identification from AI-modelled data.
Maternity leave 2013-2015
Postdoctoral Researcher – University of Plymouth, UK. 2012-2013
Worked with taxonomists for taxa identification, linking imagery with traditional (specimen based) taxonomy for cataloguing deep-sea corals as a field guide.
Postdoctoral Researcher – Ifremer, Brest, France. 2011-2012
Identification and mapping of cold-water coral habitats in the Bay of Biscay, lead data analysis of historic imagery data to feed into the EU project CoralFISH. Lead collection of coral specimens from cruise that laid foundations of 2012 coral identification workshop. Development of standard protocols for the analysis of imagery data and the definition of cold-water coral habitats (see Davies et al. 2019).
Research Assistant – University of Plymouth, UK. 2005-2007
Participated in 2 large Strategic Environmental Assessment of the UK offshore area, identifying taxa and mapping of ANNEX I habitats to provide data to UK government for conservation efforts. Compiled a coldwater coral database using a variety of data sources (e.g. journals and original research expedition reports) to allow interpretation and mapping of historical data to examine latitudinal distribution, zonation and diversity of CWC in the NE Atlantic) see Hall-Spencer et al. 2007).
