Lisa-Ann Gershwin

Lisa-Ann Gershwin is a biologist based in Launceston, Tasmania, who has described over 200 species of jellyfish,^[1] and developed a system to predict blooms of the hazardous Irukandji jellyfish in north Queensland. She led a team that discovered that the blooms coincide with the blooming of salps, and that these were prompted by upwelling after the dying down of trade winds.^[2] She has described several poisonous jellyfish—nine species of irukandji,^[3] including the Queensland species Malo kingi and Malo maximus,^[4] and the giant irukandji species Keesingia gigas from Western Australia, which was discovered without tentacles.^[5]

Gershwin was one of the co-describers of the unusual jellyfish Bazinga rieki, which is the sole member of the new family Bazingidae and partly named for the colloquialism uttered by Dr. Sheldon Cooper in the TV program The Big Bang Theory.^[6] In early 2014, a giant "snotty" jellyfish some 1.5 m in diameter was discovered at a beach in Howden, south of Hobart. Studied by Gershwin currently, it is due to be described in a future paper.^[7]

In 2013, Gershwin published a book describing the diversity and adaptability of jellyfish, and their increasing numbers at the expense of other organisms worldwide, through overfishing, pollution and modification of the marine environment. She concedes there is little that can be done to reverse or even halt the process of the marine environment becoming dominated by jellyfish worldwide.^[8]

Gershwin is related to composer George Gershwin.^[3]

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