James Cook University’s Professor Terry Hughes last night won one of the prestigious Australian Museum Eureka Prizes.
Professor Hughes, who is the Director of the ARC Centre of Excellence Coral Reef Studies based at JCU, won the Sherman Eureka Prize for Environmental Research.
One of the world’s leading coral reef scientists, Professor Hughes joined James Cook University in 1990 and has twice been awarded a Federation Fellowship.
Worth $10, 000, the Sherman Eureka Prize for Environmental Research (2007) is sponsored by the Sherman Foundation and is awarded for research in any field of the biological, physical, mathematical or biomedical sciences leading to the resolution of an environmental problem or the improvement of our natural environment.
Born in Ireland, Professor Hughes came to JCU via 12 years of study and research in the United States.
A graduate of Trinity College in Dublin, he received a Masters and then PhD from John Hopkins in the US before becoming a post-doctoral fellow at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
He describes his journey to Australia in 1990 as acquiring his first real job at the world leader in coral reef research after three degrees, three children and three continents.
He is the inaugural director of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies which is a partnership of James Cook University, the Australian Institute of Marine Science, the Australian National University, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, and the University of Queensland.
Funded by the Australian Government in 2005, the Centre is based at JCU and cements Australia's leading contribution to coral reef sciences, and fosters stronger collaborative links between the major partners and 24 other leading institutions in nine countries. According to ISI Essential Science Indicators, the Centre's four major research partners all rank in the top 20 institutions world-wide for citations for coral reef science with JCU ranking 1st (among 1644 institutions in 103 countries) Collectively, the Centre creates the world's largest concentration of coral reef scientists.
Contact: JCU Media Liaison, Jim O’Brien 07 4781 4822 or 0418 892449