The Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA) scheme is a separate element of the Discovery Program. The DECRA scheme will provide more focused support for researchers and create more opportunities for early-career researchers in both teaching and research, and research-only positions.

 Alexander Skeels received a DECRA (DE250100004) for 2025-2027. How environmental change drives the origin and decline of biodiversity. This project aims to measure the effects of past environmental change on the emergence of biodiversity in Indo-Australasia. By integrating high-resolution reconstructions of past environments and new simulation models, this project expects to generate new knowledge on the way biodiversity develops in a mega-diverse and climatically dynamic region. Anticipated outcomes include: an open-source historical environmental database, innovative new methods and software tools for the global research community, and a deeper understanding of the responses of organisms to environmental change. Significant benefits include identifying groups of species that have been vulnerable to historical environmental change to help predict future vulnerability.