Megan completed her PhD studentship at Cardiff University under the supervision of Dr. Benoît Goossens and Prof. Pete Kille. Her research explored the influences of habitat fragmentation and agro-expansion on the spatial ecology, diet, and ecotoxicology of Bornean small carnivores. As the Assistant Scientific Officer of Danau Girang Field Centre, she was stationed in the middle of the jungle in Sabah, Malaysian Borneo for the majority of each year traipsing about after civets and otters. During her PhD, when she wasn’t thigh-deep in mud and covered in mosquitos, she spent her time in Cardiff, normally during the winter for  lab work.

The expansion of the palm oil industry is a very real threat to the biodiversity persisting in increasingly fragmented and degraded forests in the Kinabatangan floodplain. By utilizing GPS collars, biological samples, and behavioural data, the project strives to discover how the carnivore guild is responding to anthropogenic pressures in the Lower Kinabatangan Wildlife Sanctuary. Additionally, Meg worked to develop a non-invasive protocol for monitoring the presence and persistence of agro-chemicals and heavy metals throughout the landscape.