As part of her research Moles spent two years backpacking her way through 75 study sites around the world including China, Patagonia, the Republic of Congo and Greenland collecting other information to feed into a large database on native plant traits. During this trip she recorded plant height, how the plants were being eaten by insects and other animals and information on plant defence mechanisms. Moles said this project was carried out on a "shoestring" and relied on hiring local field assistants, "everything from an Argentinian goat-herder to a villager from Kabo in the Congo." She trained the local field assistants to tag leaves and come back regularly to see how much they'd been eaten over time, and to send photographs of the leaves to her. "We've now got about 500,000 pictures of leaves with holes that we're working through," she said. Last week, Moles received an Australian Research Council grant to study plant traits in weeds, which may one day be useful in weed management. Earlier this year she also received a 2008 L'Oreal Australia For Women in Science Fellowship for her research. Related Links: Flickr Image of a Double Coconut Australian Institute of Policy and Science Treehugger: Saving Seeds Critical to Combatting Climate Change |
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