Evolutionary and Conservation Genomics Research Group
Emily Roycroft – Group Leader
Emily is a Lecturer in the School of Biological Sciences at Monash University. She is interested in how genomes can help us to reconstruct the history of life, understand the past, and guide future conservation of threatened species. She did her PhD at the University of Melbourne, followed by four years at the Australian National University working on evolutionary genomics of Australian biodiversity, along the way ‘resurrecting’ the Gould’s mouse from extinction. She won an ARC DECRA Fellowship in 2023, and the L’Oreal-UNESCO For Women in Science Fellowship in 2024, and is passionate advocate for equity and diversity in science.
Charlotte Drury – PhD student (2025 – )
(Honours First Class, 2024)
Charlotte completed her honours supervised by Emily at ANU in 2024, and made the move to Monash for her PhD. Charlotte’s PhD uses genomic approaches to address conservation and evolutionary questions across Australian marsupials. She is taking a whole-genome approach to look at population health (genetic diversity, inbreeding, demography and genetic lead) of the Barrow Island wallaroo, and investigating the potential genetic basis of its non-generative normocytic hypochromic anaemia. Charlotte is also delving into macroevolutionary patterns of introgression in marsupials, and working on a mitochondrial genome reference database for Australian mammals to enable eDNA studies of threatened species.
Tucksaorn Bhummakasikara – PhD student (2025 – )
Tucksaorn (Orn) is applying genomic approaches to evaluate the success of genetic rescue and inform captive breeding in the threatened Pookila (New Holland mouse). Orn is also investigating broad-scale population genomics of the Pookila, including the potentially extinct mainland Tasmanian population. Orn did her undergraduate and Masters degree at Mahidol University in Thailand, and is an experienced conservation geneticist, having worked in the Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation in Thailand for the past 8 years. Orn’s project is supported by funding the the Holsworth Wildlife Research Endowment, the Australian Government, Zoos Victoria and Monash University. Orn was the 2026 recipient of the Sidney James Prize from the Genetics Society of Australasia.
Camille Kynoch – PhD student (2024 – )
Camille is investigating the impact of climate-induced male scarcity in the threatened Australian flatback sea turtle, applying genomic approaches to explore population genetics, parentage, demographic history, and the relationship between genetic diversity and individual fitness. Camille has been highly successful in obtaining competitive funding for her project, including from the Australian Academy of Science (Margaret Middleton Award), Holsworth Wildlife Research Endowment, and the Sea World Research & Rescue Foundation. Camille is also part of the Ecophysiology and Conservation Research Group at Monash, led by Prof. Richard Reina.
Max Guzenko – Research Assistant (2025 – )
(Honours First Class, 2024)
Max completed their honours in 2024 at Monash University investigating the form, function and development of primate canines with the Evans lab. They became keenly interested in bioinformatics and conservation genomics following their undergraduate project on recombination rates in the endangered Macquarie perch, and now work with us as a Research Assistant.
Joely Echalar – PhD student (April 2023 – )
Joely is focusing on the Australian delicate mouse group – one of our favourite study systems! Joely has assembled reference genomes for several species across the delicate mouse group, to explore the role of selection and genome organisation in speciation. She has also been looking at the role of introgression and incomplete lineage sorting in Australo-Papuan rodents. Joely is also supervised by Dr. Sally Potter and Dr. Oliver Griffith.
Naomi Monk – PhD student
Naomi is investigating changes in the terrestrial biodiversity across the Southern Ocean islands. Her work is also part of the Chown Lab, led by Professor Steven Chown FAA, and the Securing Antarctica’s Environmental Future (SAEF) program. She focuses primarily on weevils, a diverse group of beetles found within the region, seeking to understand how populations may be changing in response to the rapid environmental change with the aim to inform decision making for conservation. The genetic component of her work involves using SNPs to investigate the genetic diversity in weevil populations isolated by glaciers on Heard Island to predict changes associated with the island’s rapid ice melt.
Alumni
Ching Ching Lau – Masters by Research (2022 – 2023), Research Assistant (2023 – 2025)
Ching Ching did her MSc in Quantitative Biology & Bioinformatics (Advanced) at ANU on predictors of genetic diversity in Gehyra geckos, supervised by Emily. Check out the now-published paper from on her Masters project here. Following her Masters, Ching Ching continued working with us as a Research Assistant across various genomics projects. In 2025, Ching Ching was a joint recipient of the Australian Museum Eureka Prize for Excellence in Research Software, for her work on the dartR software package.
Ching Ching is now a PhD student in the Schwessinger Group at ANU, and is working on the genomics of fungal pathogens.
Ella Dunn – Undergraduate Research Student
Ella has joined our research group in 2025 for an undergraduate research project, where she explored genetic divergence between island and mainland populations of Australian mammals, and tested predictors of genetic divergence on islands. While in our lab, Ella was selected for the Genetics Society of Australasia Undergraduate Conference Award, and as part of that had the opportunity to attend the 2025 GSA Conference in Auckland.
Ella has landed a graduate position in the Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action (DEECA), and will be starting in the role in early 2027. Congratulations Ella!
Emily Blackburn – Honours student (2025 – 2026)
Emily joined our lab for her honours year where she worked on the Leadbeater’s Possum, assessing the genetic diversity of the lowland population to identify ideal candidates for translocation and genetic rescue. Emily was awarded the 2025 Dan Gilmore Scholarship to support her Honours research. Emily’s project was jointly supervised by Sasha Pavlova, Diana Robledo Ruiz (Monash), Dan Harley and Arabella Eyre (Zoos Vic).
Emily is now the Threatened Species Coordinator at Moonlit Sanctuary, where she is reponsible for threatened species conservation initiatives and breeding programs based at the sanctuary.
Cody Brown – Honours student (2025)
Cody did his honours with us in 2025 on comparative phylogeography, genetic diversity, and demographic history of co-distributed small mammals across northern Australia. Cody’s project tested patterns of concordance/discordance across biogeographic barriers in the delicate mouse group, chestnut mice, and rock rats.
