The CBA can help facilitate ANU and UC students spending time in CSIRO labs, providing valuable exposure to CSIRO scientists and research. Co-supervised honours projects also afford an excellent opportunity to develop collaborative linkages between CSIRO staff and university researchers.

The CBA may provide up to $15,000 for operational expenses and stipends for a honours student enrolled at ANU or University of Canberra with a CSIRO co-supervisor. 

In consultation with the CBA Director and Liaison Committee, this initiative may be modified to include external partners other than CSIRO, such as supervisors from Goverment agencies or NGOs.

Eligibility

CBA-funded honours projects will allow students to maintain and develop their university connections and research skills while being exposed to CSIRO research and researchers. 

Proposed projects should have a biodiversity science focus (evolutionary biology, population and ecosystem ecology, genomics, bioinformatics, and/or spatial modelling) and allow students genuine engagement across both their university and CSIRO labs.

The student will need to be enrolled, with a primary supervisor, at one of our partner universities (ANU or UC) and be co-supervised by at least one CSIRO researcher. A document that introduces the honours year to potential external co-supervisors can be found above under Downloads.

You may already have a potential student in mind or we can help advertise your proposed project for either the January or mid-year intake of honours students.

Information on honours programs:

• Research School of Biology (ANU)
• Fenner School of Envionment & Society (ANU)
• Institute of Applied Ecology (UC)

How to apply

Using the template (above under Downloads) send us your potential honours project idea. 

Applications will be assessed by the CBA Director and Liaison Committee in terms of the above eligibility criteria.

Reporting

We would like to recieve a copy of the student's thesis abstract on submission and an expenditure report (a simple spreadsheet is fine). We also expect, if possible, that the student will present the findings of their project in a seminar to the CBA community.

We would also like to know if the project resulted in any publications, future collaborations/ co-supervision, or had any applied outcomes - e.g. management, policy.

Previous CBA-funded student projects

• Telomere length as a biomarker for stress in an Australian pest moth
• Beating the heat? Population genomics of climate change in Australian birds
• Uncovering the hare microbiome
• Bill adaptation in parrots: finding loci involved in surface area increases by integrating morphometrics with Next Gen Sequencing​
• Will polyploidy provide a reproductive advantage in a changing climate? A test case with Themeda triandra (Kangaroo grass)
• Sequencing the genome of an Australian Alpine plant
• Evolution of chemical defences in Tasmanian dalodesmid millipedes (Diplopoda: Dalodesmidae)
• Exploring Australia’s diversity for pathogens of weeds
• Using herbarium specimens to determine the drivers of mast seeding in spinifex and hence the drivers of boom-bust growth in vertebrate populations of arid Australia
• A comparative approach to understanding gene flow in avian species across Sahul
• How will alpine soil invertebrate communities respond to drier soils and changing snow dynamics due to climate change? 
• Using Directed Evolution to Engineer a Black Soldier Fly Larvae-Associated Microbiome to Degrade Cellulose Waste