Study with us
Progress your academic career with Kings Park scientists.
Kings Park Science staff co-supervise projects in plant biology, conservation biology and restoration ecology at all Western Australian universities.
Contact Science Administration for more information on any of these opportunities.
Kings Park Summer Scholarships
Interested in transitioning into a Masters or PhD program?
These annual scholarships provide the opportunity for talented students contemplating honours or post-graduate research in native plant conservation biology or restoration ecology to undertake a 12-week research project, under supervision of scientists.
Internships
Interested in an industry placement as part of your undergraduate course or transitioning into the workforce?
We partner with universities globally to provide undergraduate student placements within our research group. Students can undertake laboratory or field-based research activities that help them understand conservation challenges whilst working towards their degree.
We also provide annual opportunities for students completing their PhD programs to engage with specific research projects. These enable students to apply their skills to a contemporary conservation challenge and provide them with direct industry experience.
PhD opportunities
Interested in becoming a world leading researcher in conservation science?
Students with a personal scholarship can design their own project aligned with current research themes or take advantage of specific scholarship opportunities offered by external / industry funding.
Indicative projects available for students are organised by research theme below.
Conservation Biotechnology
- Cryo-conservation for endangered plants; researching and developing novel cryogenic technologies for long-term preservation in liquid nitrogen.
- Genetics of cryopreserved plant material: can genetic stability be presumed, or is there more to it?
- Cryoinjury and oxidation stress: understanding source, effect and mitigation.
- The emergency ward: developing micropropagation for endangered plants needing conservation and restoration.
- Investigation of photoautotrophic growth for difficult to micropropagate species.
- Understanding physiology of micropropagated plant responses to stress incurred during transfer from the in vitro environment to soil and ex vitro conditions.
Conservation Genetics
- Towards a provenance atlas for priority species: applying genetic and non-genetic approaches for defining seed collection zones for restoration.
- Genecological assessment of local adaptation and the response of plant populations to climate change: implications for seed sourcing for restoration.
- Mapping restoration soil biota through time and space with eDNA tools.
- Conservation genetics: pattern and process for rare species management and recovery.
- Evolutionary and conservation consequences of pollination by birds and mammals.
- Adaptive resilience of seagrass to extreme climatic events.
- Restoration implications of ploidy variation in spinifex.
- Molecular phylogenetics and systematics of native plant taxa.
Ecosystem Ecology
- How plant functional traits interact with varying fire season, intensity or interval to influence the persistence of plant populations under different fire regimes.
- How fire regimes interact with drivers such as herbivore abundance, weed cover and climate change to influence biodiversity conservation, fire risk management and invasive species.
- The impacts of grassy weed invasion of native species and fire hazard.
- Fuel dynamics and spatial modelling of fire regimes and fire risk to inform bushland management.
- The function of digging mammals, such as bandicoots, in altering soil properties and microbial communities to enhance litter decomposition and seedling establishment.
- Understanding ecological, physiological and hydrological processes underlying tree decline and ecosystem change in Banksia woodlands.
- The population ecology, seed biology and fire response of invasive plant species.
- Positive synergies and potential negative outcomes from fire and weed management.
- Pollination and dispersal processes in natural, fragmented and restored landscapes.
Restoration Science
- Designing restoration systems based on plant-soil relations and feedbacks.
- Defining plant physiological thresholds and function in restoration environments.
- Identifying natural analogues for vegetation restoration to post mine sites.
- Predicting future responses of Australia’s dominant hummock grasslands to climate change during regeneration.
- Ecosystem health in restoration chronosequence across urban bushlands.
- Defining ecological functionality of restoration sites in the Wheatbelt.
Seed Science
- Predicting the longevity of seeds in storage for the conservation of plant biodiversity.
- Ecophysiology of seed dormancy and germination for seed propagation and conservation.
- Developing seed enhancement technologies to improve seedling establishment in ecosystem restoration.
- Identifying seed regeneration traits that can predict seedling establishment in ecosystem restoration.
- Engineering design and construction of mechanised seeders for efficient seed delivery in ecosystem restoration.
- Adaptive consequences of polyploidy on the seed biology of spinifex.
Species Recovery
- Development of novel translocation approaches for restoration of rare and short-range endemic flora.
- Integrated propagation of endemic and range restricted recalcitrant species.
- Seed ecology of short-range endemics and implications for restoration of minesite impacted taxa.
- Threatened flora restoration: defining the ecological drivers of rarity to inform restoration approaches for mine site management of narrow range endemic species.
- Pollination biology of threatened plant species.