Sophie Mills
PhD candidate
Sophie’s research journey began as a Research Technician at the Cape Eleuthera Institute in the Bahamas, where she gathered population and behavioural data on sea turtles and contributed to educational outreach efforts aimed at protecting native snake species. She then completed her Master’s degree at Purdue University Fort Wayne, where her research focused on innovative methods to assess and mitigate handling stress in sea turtles, employing advanced tools like bio-loggers, UAVs, and photo ID software. Following her Master’s, she became a Lab Manager at Florida State University overseeing sea turtle research projects in the Gulf of Mexico, including boat strike surveys and bio-logger deployment.
Sophie’s PhD research will explore how conservation strategies can support sea turtles’ resilience to climate change and will examine whether performance metrics can reliably indicate individual ability and survival potential. Her research will evaluate climate impacts across sea turtle life stages to optimise mitigation strategies that align with natural adaptations, such as female-biased hatchling production in warmer conditions. Through targeted nest shading, she will investigate ways to enhance hatching success without disrupting adaptive mechanisms or hatchling performance. She will then assess whether hatchlings from naturally warmer nests perform better under warm conditions to understand how nest shading might influence performance in a changing climate. By testing the repeatability and predictive value of fitness metrics, she aims to identify reliable indicators of hatchling resilience and survival, ultimately contributing to science-based conservation strategies that increase sea turtle populations facing rapid environmental change.
Co-supervised by Dr Sean Williamson, Monash University