Kezia Drane

Research Project: Effects antibiotic resistant bacteria and their causative genes in wastewater have on the receiving environments ecology

Kezia is Townsville born and bred with a Bachelors degree in Biomedical Science. She became involved with the Caraplace as a volunteer in 2017 and worked as a team leader to keep the turtle hatchlings healthy. Before she started her PhD, Kezia was working full time as a microbiologist.

Her current research looks at antibiotic resistant bacteria and their causative genes in wastewater, trying to figure out if these have effects in the receiving environments ecology. Therefore, she looks at different factors, like the seawater, the sediment, the seagrass and in the end the green sea turtles, to see how the antibiotic resistant bacteria propagates within them. Kezia is just in her first year of her PhD, but she could imagine working for AIMS or CSIRO in the future.