The scientists of the Australian Museum Research Institute are hard at work investigating the world’s biodiversity – which sometimes means discovering animals not previously known to science. These discoveries teach us what has come before us, and what we need to protect for the generations that will come after us.  

In the final episode of Explore we head out into the field – from the deepest ocean trenches to the peaks of the Himalayas – to discover how the Australian Museum’s Chief Scientist Professor Kris Helgen and palaeontologist Patrick Smith identify new species, and what it means to add new branches to the Tree of Life.  

Guests: Professor Kris Helgen, Dr Patrick Smith, Dr Tim O’Hara and the scientists aboard the CSIRO RV Investigator

Host: Alice Gage

Find images, extra stories and transcript at australian.museum/explore

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Professor Kristofer M. Helgen is Chief Scientist and Director of the Australian Museum Research Institute. He is responsible for a team of more than 100 staff, including research scientists, collection scientists, collection officers and more than 130 associates, fellows and students, who research and explore the natural world. Kris was most recently Professor of Biological Sciences at the University of Adelaide. He has focused his research primarily on fieldwork with living animals and research in museum collections to document the richness of life, understand global change, and contribute to important problems in biomedicine. Originally from Minnesota, Kris gained his undergraduate degree in Biology at Harvard University and his Ph.D. in Zoology as a Fulbright Fellow at the University of Adelaide.

Dr Patrick Smith is a technical officer in the Palaeontology Collection at the Australian Museum Research Institute. He obtained a PhD at Macquarie University looking at Middle Cambrian (500–510 million year old) marine invertebrates from Ross River Gorge near Alice Springs in central Australia. He also was a previous curator at the Richmond Marine Fossil Museum (Kronosaurus Korner) in far northwest Queensland and a technical officer in the geology department at the University of New South Wales. Currently he is working to database the Australian Museum’s entire Palaeontology Collection. This includes all the material onsite, as well as the material at the museum offsite storage facility. 

Dr Tim O'Hara is the Senior Curator, Marine Zoology, at Museums Victoria. He uses museum collections to answer large-scale questions about the distribution of seafloor animals around the globe. This research includes aspects of biogeography, macroecology, phylogeny, and phylogeography. Tim's taxonomic speciality is the Ophiurodea (brittle-stars), a class of echinoderms that are a dominant component of the seafloor fauna. 

Alice Gage is the producer, writer and host of the Australian Museum’s Explore podcast, and editor of Explore, its biannual magazine. Alice is an editor, writer and content creator interested in the nexus of science, cultural knowledge and art. She founded and published cult art journal Ampersand Magazine from 2009-2013. Alice lives on Bidjigal Country with her husband and their two little redheads. She holds an MA in Communications from Melbourne University and a BA in English from Sydney University.  

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If, like us, you’re anxious about the climate emergency, tune in: this episode is all about the gaining of wisdom in an uncertain world. We look to science, innovation and First Nations knowledges to learn how one young Australian is detoxifying the ocean and atmosphere, and what the world’s oldest link between humans and the land can teach us about managing the environment.  

In his 2021 Australian Museum Talbot Oration, Professor Tim Flannery calls for solutions. One of those is floating out at sea – a native seaweed called asparogopsis, which when fed to cows substantially reduces their methane emissions. Another solution is listening to First Nations people, whose successful stewardship of Country for time immemorial saw both people and the environment thrive. Australian Museum First Nations curator Dr Mariko Smith discusses what one new acquisition – the Kimberley Boab Nut Collection – can teach us about this legacy.    

Guests: Professor Tim Flannery, Sam Elsom and Dr Mariko Smith 

Host: Alice Gage

Find images, extra stories and transcript at australian.museum/explore

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Sam Elsom is the founder and CEO of Sea Forest. He is a passionate environmentalist with over 15 years’ experience in sustainability. Having founded one of Australia’s first sustainable apparel businesses to measuring social and environmental impact across supply chains as well as implementing a satellite factory in India to support poor communities with income, training, clean water and education. Sam was drawn to explore seaweed cultivation for its impressive capacity to sequester CO2 as a potential solution to reverse Climate Change. 

Professor Tim Flannery is the Distinguished Visiting Fellow focussed on researching the impacts of climate change and raising awareness of the issues, especially impacts on biodiversity and our coastal environments. He is an internationally acclaimed scientist, author, explorer and conservationist. In recognition of his work on the Climate Commission and the Climate Council, he was recently awarded the Geddes Environment Medal by the Royal Scottish Geographical Society.

Dr Mariko Smith is a Yuin woman and Manager, First Nations Collections & Engagement at the Australian Museum. Mariko focuses on Indigenous community-based cultural resurgence initiatives and incorporating Indigenous ways of knowing into curatorial and artistic practices. Mariko holds a combined Bachelor degree in Arts and Laws (University of Sydney), a Master of Museum Studies (University of Sydney) and Doctor of Philosophy from the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (University of Sydney). Her PhD thesis focused on the cultural resurgence of Aboriginal tied-bark canoe making in south-eastern Aboriginal communities. Mariko is an Honorary Associate in the School of Literature, Art & Media at the University of Sydney. 

Alice Gage is the producer, writer and host of the Australian Museum’s Explore podcast, and editor of Explore, its biannual magazine. Alice is an editor, writer and content creator interested in the nexus of science, cultural knowledge and art. She founded and published cult art journal Ampersand Magazine from 2009-2013. Alice lives on Bidjigal Country with her husband and their two little redheads. She holds an MA in Communications from Melbourne University and a BA in English from Sydney University.  

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Australia’s natural history museums, like many government institutions that played a role in colonisation, have been viewed with great suspicion by First Nations Peoples. Today, the Australian Museum stands firm in its commitment to acknowledge the wrongs of the past. Part of that process is truth-telling. In this episode, Laura McBride – Wailwan and Kooma woman, and Director, First Nations, at the Australian Museum – shares three important pieces of the 2021 exhibition, Unsettled.  

We hear from Aunty Fay Mosely, a Wiradjuri Elder who was taken from her family when she was ten years old; we will travel back to 1770 to hear the accounts of Kaureg Ppeoples on the arrival of Cook’s tall ship; and we will return to the present to learn an Aboriginal teaching of caring for one another and sharing with one another. 

Guests: Aunty Fay Mosley, Uncle Richard Waubin Aken, and Fleur and Laurance Magick Dennis 

Host: Laura McBride

Find images, extra stories and transcript at australian.museum/explore

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Elder Waubin Richard Aken is a Traditional Owner of the island of Tuined and appointed Tribal Historian for Kaurareg First Nations people. He works with elders of the Kaurareg lands and waters to strengthen alliances with the wider Cape York community. Richard was involved in the re-establishment of the Horn Island community through a Native Title Claim of the Kaurareg nation and actively participates in the maintenance of his people’s unique culture. 

Fleur and Laurance Magick Dennis Milan Dhiiyaan means “One Family or One Mob”. We are referring to all of us, all of humanity, as one family on mother earth. Milan Dhiiyaan provides Aboriginal cultural immersion experiences for both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people of our Australian and global community. Milan Dhiiyaan is led by Wiradjuri/Wailwaan songwoman and senior cultural educator Nyimirr (Fleur Magick Dennis) and Wailwaan/Yuin songman and senior cultural educator Millmullian (Laurance Magick Dennis).

Aunty Fay Mosely is a strong Wiradjuri woman, Elder, artist and advocate for the Stolen Generations, working hard to support other stolen children in re-connecting with their families and cultures, and having their stories heard. 

Laura McBride is a Wailwan and Kooma woman and Director, First Nations at the Australian Museum. In this role, Laura leads the First Nations strategic direction and operations, as well as managing the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and Pasifika collections. Laura’s vision for the AM centres on prioritising and amplifying First Nations voices so that Aboriginal, Torres Strait Islander, and Pacific communities represent themselves and their cultures within the Museum. Laura’s projects at the AM include the development of Garrigarrang: Sea Country and the award-winning GADI exhibition. She conducted ground-breaking First Nations community consultation through The 2020 Project that informed the First Nations-led exhibition Unsettled, which she co-curated, that opened at the AM in May 2021. Laura holds a Bachelor of Arts (University of Sydney) with a double Major in Psychology and Australian Indigenous Studies, and a Master of Aboriginal Education (University of Technology Sydney). 

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