Fisheries and Marine Institute of Memorial University of Newfoundland

Thomas Brown, the Director of the Centre for Fisheries Ecosystems Research (CFER) holds a bachelor of science (honours) in biology and a master's degree in fisheries resource management from Memorial University. Tom is a versatile, highly adaptive senior manager with 20 years experience leading operations, budgeting, research projects and staff in private industry and in a post-secondary institution. Tom has extensive project management experience including contract development, budgeting, logistics and human resource allocation for 400 + research projects valued from $10,000 to in excess of 10 million dollars.

In addition to the Director of CFER, Tom currently has additional management responsibilities, including Assistant Head of the School of Fisheries (SOF) (Interim) and the Director of the Community Based Education and Training Unit (CBED).

Tom has also held positions within the NL fishing industry and at DFO.

Dr. Noel Cadigan is a quantitative fisheries scientist specializing in statistical methods for fish stock assessment and sustainable fisheries. He has extensive experience in the assessment of Newfoundland fish stocks, and experience with other Canadian, American and European stocks.

Noel received a doctor of philosophy in statistics in 1999 at the University of Waterloo, a master of applied statistics in 1993 and a bachelor of science (Honours) in 1990 from Memorial University.

He worked with Fisheries and Oceans Canada at the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Center in Newfoundland from 1990-2011 and focused on the assessment of Atlantic cod and other groundfish stocks.

Post Doc and MSc Students:

• Madhura Weerasekera
• Kunasekaran Nirmaalkanna
• Andrea Perrault
• Andrés Beita-Jiménez

Dr. Jonathan Fisher is a research scientist with interests in the structure, functioning and dynamics of marine ecosystems. He has research experience in population, community and ecosystem ecology of exploited and unexploited systems in the Northwest Atlantic.

Most recently, Jonathan was a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Biology at Queen's University and the Bedford Institute of Oceanography. He received his doctor of philosophy from the University of Pennsylvania, a master of science from Dalhousie University and a bachelor of science (Honours) from Queen's University.

Jonathan's personal webpage.

Dr. Maxime Geoffroy is a research scientist with expertise in bioacoustics, marine ecology and biological oceanography. His research aims at better understanding the ecology of North Atlantic and Arctic pelagic fish in relation to hydrography and climate change. In addition to ship-based surveys, he uses new technology, as unmanned vehicles and active acoustic moorings, to study marine ecosystems.

Prior to working at CFER, Maxime was a postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Arctic and Marine Biology of UiT the Arctic University of Norway. He holds a PhD in oceanography and an MSc in biology from Laval University, and a degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Ottawa.

Post Doc, PhD and MSc Students:

• Dr. Gérald Darnis
• Muriel Dunn
• Jennifer Herbig (co-supervised by Jonathan Fisher)
• Eugenie Jacobsen
• Ashley Oates
• Gabrielle Perugini
• Einat Sandbank
• Hannah Hynes
• Julek Chawarski
• Léa Joly

Dr. Arnault Le Bris is a research scientist with interests in understanding and quantifying processes that drive the dynamics of marine fish and shellfish populations. His past and present work has focused on evaluating how climate variability and change affects the productivity of living marine resources, and how fish migration affects the sustainable management of fisheries resources.

Originally from the Brittany region in France, Arnault first came to Newfoundland in 2009 to pursue his doctoral studies in fisheries ecology at Memorial University of Newfoundland. Before joining CFER, he was a postdoctoral fellow at the Gulf of Maine Research Institute in Portland Maine, USA.

Arnault’s personal webpage

PhD and MSc Students:

• Elanor Dillabough
• Tanya Prystay
• Jordan Woolfrey

Dr. Sherrylynn Rowe is a research scientist with CFER. Prior to joining the Centre, Sherrylynn was a research scientist with Fisheries and Oceans Canada at the Bedford Institute of Oceanography.

She received a doctor of philosophy from Dalhousie University as well as a master of science and a bachelor of science (Honours) from Memorial University. Sherrylynn's recent scientific efforts have focused on stock assessment and related research involving ecology and life history of groundfish and marine invertebrates.

Her earlier studies examined linkages between spawning behaviour and population dynamics of Atlantic cod and the role of marine protected areas in enhancing lobster populations and fisheries.

Dr. Tyler Eddy is the team lead at The Life Aquatic and is a Research Scientist at the Centre for Fisheries Ecosystems Research (CFER) Marine Institute, Memorial University of Newfoundland. Tyler lectures in the Fisheries Science Graduate Program and teaches ‘Data Collection, Management, & Display’.

Tyler is interested in past, present and future human interactions with, and ecology of, marine ecosystems.

Tyler is one of the founding coordinators of the Fisheries and Marine Ecosystem Model Intercomparison Project (FishMIP) and is a Visiting Scientist at the Charles Darwin Foundation, Galápagos Islands, Ecuador. 

Tyler was a Research Fellow at the University of South Carolina, US, with the Nereus Program, a Research Associate at the University of British Columbia, Canada, with the Nereus Program, and a Postdoctoral Fellow at Dalhousie University, Canada, with the Lenfest Ocean Program. Tyler received a PhD in Marine Biology from Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand and an Honours BSc in Marine Biology from Dalhousie University, Canada.

GitHub | Google Scholar | ResearchGate | Twitter

Post Doc, PhD and MSc Students:

• Dr. Andrea Bryndum-Buchholz
• Dr. Pablo Vajas
• Dr. Gustavo Yunda-Guarin
• Jiaying Chen
• Abe Solberg
• Raquel Ruiz-Díaz
• Alannah Wudrick
• Hannah West

Dr. Matthew Robertson is a research scientist with CFER.  Matthew’s research focuses on answering ecological and population dynamics questions in fisheries, and how those questions can be addressed to improve ecosystem-based fisheries management advice. He also teaches the ‘Statistics and Study Design for Fisheries Science’ in the Fisheries Science Graduate Program.

Matthew is a 2023 graduate of Memorial University where he received his PhD in Fisheries Science. His PhD research focused on assessing the differential recovery trajectories of flatfish on the Newfoundland Grand Banks. Prior to attending Memorial University, Matthew graduated from Louisiana State University with an MSc in Oceanography and from Dalhousie University, where he received a BSc with Honours in Marine Biology.

Lab website | Google Scholar | Github

MSc. student - Kerri Lynch