Yi-Kai Tea
Kai commenced his PhD in 2019 under the supervision of Simon Ho, Nate Lo, Anthony Gill, and Joey DiBattista (Australian Museum, Sydney). He is interested in the taxonomy, systematics, and evolution of coral reef fishes, with a focus on wrasses. Kai is active in the field of taxonomy and has described over a dozen new species of coral reef fishes, with several appearing on the covers of systematics journals.
Kai was awarded First Class Honours for his research on the stripey (Microcanthus strigatus), which he completed in the MEEP Lab under the supervision of Simon Ho, Nate Lo, and Anthony Gill (Chau Chak Wing Museum and Australian Museum). The work from his Honours project was subsequently published in the journal Molecular Ecology: “Boomeranging around Australia: Historical biogeography and population genomics of the anti‐equatorial fish Microcanthus strigatus (Teleostei: Microcanthidae)”.
For further information, please visit Kai’s personal website.
A list of Kai’s publications can be found on Google Scholar.
Awards and honours
University of Sydney
Media coverage and community engagement
Kai has a strong social media presence on both Twitter (@FishGuyKai) and Instagram (@kaithefishguy), where he actively engages with the community on new scientific discoveries, academia, and science communication.
