Out at Sea

Two University of Newcastle academics headed out to sea last week in the name of research. Dr Troy Gaston was investigating alternatives to bycatch reduction in trawl fisheries while Dr Chris Scarlett was harvesting sea sponges to look for new agents to test against pancreatic cancer cells.

They both set out on the 35 metre stern trawler dubbed Bluefin that belongs to the Australian Maritime College. Though from very different disciplines of research, Dr Gaston and Dr Scarlett both had a lot to gain from the expedition to Flinders Island.

Dr Gaston, a marine scientist in the School of Environmental and Life Sciences, is investigating alternatives to bycatch reduction in trawl fisheries. Bycatch includes non-target fish and crustaceans where up to 20kg of bycatch is caught for every kilogram of target catch in some trawl fisheries. 

Current bycatch reduction methods focus on the posterior end of the net where species have already interacted with the trawl gear and potentially suffered damage. This reduces their chance of survival if they escape using traditional reduction methods such as escape panels in the netting.

Dr Gaston's research focuses on the anterior portion of the trawl system to create an avoidance reaction of non-target fish and crustaceans while maintaining and sometimes increasing the target catch. 

As consequence of trawling activities, sponges and soft corals are often brought up in the trawl.

Dr Scarlett’s group, the Food Bioactives and Pancreatic Cancer Biology Group, has a research focus of extracting bioactive compounds from natural sources to assess their effectiveness against pancreatic cancer cells.

Dr Scarlett joined Dr Gaston on this expedition to harvest sea sponges, known for their cytotoxic properties, from the ocean floor. Dr Scarlett’s group aim to extract cytotoxic compounds from these marine invertebrates to look for new agents to test against pancreatic cancer cells. 

This study will facilitate collaborative efforts between Dr Scarlett’s group and the Marine Science program, which will assist in the expansion of research capacity at the Central Coast Campus.  

Dr Gaston is part of a collaborative team working out of that University of Tasmania that focuses on bycatch reduction which has provided the avenue for this joint research venture.