South Australian Museum - North Terrace, Adelaide, South Australia 5000

Biography

Dr Leslie Chisholm was appointed Manager of the Parasite Collection at the South Australian Museum in October, 2008. She attained her BSc (1985) and MSc (1988) degrees at the University of Guelph (UoG), Canada in Marine Biology and Marine Ecology, respectively.

Her MSc studies focused on the secondary production of copepods in the tropical waters off Jamaica, West Indies. She then switched to the study of marine parasites and worked with Dr Mary Beverley-Burton for 7 years at UoG investigating the taxonomy and systematics of monogenean (flatworm) parasites of marine fish.

In 1995 Leslie won a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) scholarship and embarked on a PhD in the Parasitology Department at The University of Queensland (UQ) in Brisbane. Her work was mostly based at Heron Island Research Station on the southern tip of The Great Barrier Reef. There she investigated the biology and taxonomy of a family of monogeneans (Monocotylidae) that infect sharks and rays.

After completion of her PhD in 1997, she took up a two-year NSERC Postdoctoral Award followed by a Research Associate position in the lab of Dr Ian Whittington to further her studies on the ecology of monocotylids on sharks and rays.
In late 2001, she moved to Adelaide.She has published over 70 peer-reviewed scientific papers and is often consulted by public aquaria for advice on identification and eradication of monogeneans infecting sharks and rays. She is editor of the International Ichthyoparasitology Newsletter which is published online annually and can be viewed at http://www.diplectanum.talktalk.net/newsletter/

Major Publications (Top 5)

Perkins E.M., Donnellan S.C, Bertozzi T., Chisholm L.A. & Whittington I.D. 2009. Looks can deceive: Molecular phylogeny of a family of flatworm ectoparasites (Monogenea: Capsalidae) does not reflect current morphological classification. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 52: 705-714.

Chisholm L.A. & Whittington I.D. 2007. Review of the Capsalinae (Monogenea: Capsalidae). Zootaxa 1559: 1-30.

Chisholm L.A. & Whittington I.D. 2003. Invasion of the shovelnose ray (Rhinobatos typus) by Neoheterocotyle rhinobatidis and Merizocotyle icopae (Monogenea: Monocotylidae). Parasitology 127: 561-570.

Chisholm L.A. & Whittington I.D. 2002. Efficacy of Praziquantel bath treatments for monogenean infections of the Rhinobatos typus. Journal of Aquatic Animal Health 14: 230-234.

Chisholm L.A., Morgan, J.A.T., Adlard R.D & Whittington I.D. 2001. Phylogenetic analysis of the Monocotylidae (Monogenea) inferred from 28S rDNA sequences. International Journal for Parasitology 31: 1253-1263.