Biography

Yvonne Sadovy was born in London, England, and received her PhD in 1986 from the University of Manchester, England. Thesis research, on the reproduction of a tropical reef damselfish, led to a long association with Puerto Rico, initially in the laboratory of Dr. Doug Shapiro at the University of Puerto Rico and then as the first female Director of the Puerto Rico government's Fishery Research Laboratory. During that period emphasis of her work shifted from questions of basic behaviour and biology in reef fishes to an increasing interest in management and conservation. In the early 1990s she discovered that Nassau grouper spawning aggregations were disappearing in parts of the Caribbean leading to a focus on the threat of fishing to reef fishes in relation to their biology, behaviour and to fishing practices. After a short-term Fishery Biologist position with the Caribbean Fishery Management Council, Dr. Sadovy took up her current teaching post at the University of Hong Kong in 1993, where she is an Associate Professor. She continues, greatly bolstered by her postgraduate students, to research the biology and fisheries of commercially important reef fishes, recently coauthoring a book on the reef fishes of Hong Kong. Dr. Sadovy is currently working on the impacts of fishing vulnerable reef fish resources, especially those that aggregate to spawn (www.scrfa.org), by the luxury live reef food fish trade centred in Southeast Asia.. She is also involved in IUCN (World Conservation Union) work on serranids and labrids, with a particular focus on developing a sustainable management plan for the recently listed Humphead wrasse, Cheilinus undulatus, on CITES Appendix II , and is a member of the IUCN Species Survival Commission Steering Committee. She has authored or co-authored over 100 scientific and other articles, ranging from basic reproduction of reef fishes and mariculture issues, to biological responses to fishing, theoretical aspects of fish conservation and management, and popular articles.

Please see Professor Sadovy's homepage for more biographical information and research activities.