Prof. Larry M. Page
| Title of Speech: Asian Society of Ichthyology: History and Goals BIO: Larry is Curator of Fishes at the Florida Museum of Natural History and Professor in the University of Florida Department of Biology. He was the founding Director of iDigBio, the U.S. National Resource for Advancing Digitization of Biodiversity Collections funded by the National Science Foundation. His primary research interests are in the systematics, evolution, and ecology of freshwater fishes, and the protection of aquatic natural areas. His current research emphasis is on taxonomy, phylogenetic relationships, and speciation in freshwater organisms in Southeast Asia and in the use of natural history collections data in research and outreach. |
Prof. Timothy Ravasi
| Title of Speech: Adaptation and Acclimation of Coral Reef Fish as a Response to Climate Change BIO: Tim is a Professor of Marine Science and the Principal Investigator of the Marine Climate Change Unit at OIST, an Adjunct Professor at the Australian Research Council Center of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies at the James Cook University. Tim’s research interest lies on the current status of coral reef ecosystems. He is particularly interested in looking at ecologically relevant issues in the light of rapid environmental change, such as climate change. Using integrative approaches, he seeks to identify mechanisms responsible for the acclimation and adaptation of coral reef fish to rising ocean temperatures, acidification and other human-made environmental stressors. |
Dr. Alifa Bintha Haque
| Title of Speech: Ethnoecological approaches for science and right based shark/marine conservation in the Global South BIO: Alifa is a faculty member in the Department of Zoology at the University of Dhaka, where she founded the Bengal Elasmo Lab Collaboration. She teaches courses while conducting marine research and recently completed her doctorate at the Nature-based Solutions Initiative, University of Oxford, supported by the Bangabandhu Scholarship. Her research, "Towards a Socially Just Sustainable Fishery Preserving Sharks and Rays in the Bay of Bengal," focuses on developing a sustainability model for threatened shark and ray species in collaboration with fishing communities. Dr. Haque has created a platform for research-based conservation, bridging knowledge gaps and engaging fishers in decision-making. Since 2021, she has led a project with ten fishing vessels using a mobile app to collect data, piloting the "FishSafe" technology to monitor by-catch events. This initiative provides fishers with communication networks in remote areas, promoting organized live releases and self-regulated catch monitoring. Alifa’s work lies at the intersection of endangered species conservation and the livelihoods of fishers in Bangladesh, aiming to develop a community-empowered fishery model that balances species preservation with sustainable practices. |
Prof. Jodie L. Rummer
| Title of Speech: From genes to [almost] giants: Climate change, oxygen, and the future of Indo-Pacific fishes BIO: Jodie Rummer is a Professor of Marine Biology at James Cook University (JCU), specializing in marine biology and comparative physiology. Her academic journey spans the U.S., Canada, and Hong Kong, before joining JCU in 2011 as an Australian Research Council (ARC) Super Science Fellow. Promoted to full Professor in 2022, she is an ARC Early Career Discovery Fellow and serves on the UNESCO advisory panel for global ocean deoxygenation. Jodie’s research focuses on the physiology, ecology, and evolution of coral reef fishes and sharks, addressing conservation issues related to climate change and other human impacts. She has published over 150 peer-reviewed articles and book chapters and presented at over 120 conferences globally. She is also the incoming President of the Australian Coral Reef Society and a spokesperson for the Climate Media Centre. More on her advocacy for biodiversity and climate action continues to inspire and educate. Learn more about her work at www.jodierummer.com. |
Prof. Katsufumi Sato
| Title of Speech: Biologging intelligent Platform (BiP): An integrated and standardized platform for sharing, visualizing, and analyzing Biologging data BIO: Katsu is a Professor at Atmosphere and Ocean Research Institute of the University of Tokyo. He studies comparative physiology and behavior of animals using a biologging method, which investigates phenomena in or around free-ranging organisms that are beyond the boundary of our visibility or experience. Animal-borne recorders play a significant role in his studies. Recently he has been developing a biologging database named “Biologging intelligent Platform: BiP”, in which everybody can upload, standardize and open biologging data with metadata. Those data will be used for the sustainable symbiotic relationship between marine organisms and humans. |
Prof. Masaki Miya
| Title of Speech: Unraveling the Evolution and Ecology of 35,000 Fish Species through Technological Innovations: A Personal Reflection on Four Decades of Research and Discoveries BIO: Dr. Masaki Miya is a Senior Principal Research Scientist at the Natural History Museum & Institute, Chiba, and a Visiting Professor at Waseda University. In 1999, he developed a high-throughput whole mitochondrial genome sequencing method, enabling large-scale data generation and leading to a series of groundbreaking hypotheses on fish phylogenies. These pioneering hypotheses, referred to as the “21st-century fish phylogenies,” were later corroborated by large-scale nuclear genome analyses. In 2015, he developed novel PCR primers, laying the foundation for an environmental DNA (eDNA) metabarcoding approach known as the MiFish method, which has since revolutionized fish biodiversity assessment by enabling species detection from a single bucket of water. Now widely recognized as a global standard, the MiFish method has been applied in over 200 empirical studies across marine and freshwater ecosystems worldwide. Since publishing his first paper in 1985, Dr. Miya has authored 195 scientific papers, which have collectively earned 21,601 citations as of March 9, 2025. In the 2023 edition of the “World’s Top 2% Researchers,” he was ranked 15,044th out of 223,152 scientists worldwide, placing him in the top 0.135% of researchers for that year. |