Associate Professor Randall W. Robinson

Randall is Executive Director (Interim) of the Institute for Sustainable Industries and Liveable Cities in VU Research.

After completing undergraduate studies and working for the Victorian Government as a botanist for many years he returned to academia and completed an MSc and a PhD in plant ecology. The MSc investigated recruitment mechanisms and response to disturbance of grassland forb species and the PhD was in recruitment mechanisms and clonality in Melaleuca ericifolia.

He is currently undertaking research into recruitment and clonality in seagrass, allelopathy of invasive plants and genetics of the genus Cymbidium. Additionally, he is collaborating with a group of ecologists, geneticists and educators looking at two main areas of endeavour:

• flight initiation distance in birds
• long-term monitoring of environmental change in grassland and coastal ecosystems.

Randall’s work is published in a wide range of journals and industry publications and he has a special interest in providing talks and presentations to community and industry groups

Randall lectures into the Bachelor of Science (Specialisations in Biotechnology, Chemistry or Environmental Management), teaching and coordinating a variety of units and supervising projects, industry placements and research for third year ecology and environmental management undergraduate projects and honours, masters and PhD students.

In addition to his work on plant ecology, Randall is supervising students and Postdoctoral Research Fellows carrying out work on population ecology of Australian sea lions and Australian birds, most notably research into the genetic basis for flight initiation distance in black swans.