Michelle Kelly (born 1961), also known as Michelle Kelly-Borges, is a New Zealand scientist who specialises in

sponge Sponges, the members of the phylum Porifera (; meaning 'pore bearer'), are a basal animal clade as a sister of the diploblasts. They are multicellular organisms that have bodies full of pores and channels allowing water to circulate through t ...

s, their chemistry, their evolution, taxonomy, systematics, and ecology.

Early life and education

Born in Otago in 1961, Kelly lived in Papua New Guinea with her family from 1970 to 1980, and was educated at

The Correspondence School Te Aho o Te Kura Pounamu or Te Kura (formerly The Correspondence School) is New Zealand's largest school with around 25,000 students enrolled each year, from early childhood to secondary level. It is headquartered in Portland Crescent in Thorndon ...

. From 1980, she studied at the

University of Auckland , mottoeng = By natural ability and hard work , established = 1883; years ago , endowment = NZD $293 million (31 December 2021) , budget = NZD $1.281 billion (31 December 2021) , chancellor = Cecilia Tarrant , vice_chancellor = Dawn F ...

, and completed a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University of ...

degree in 1983, and a

Master of Science A Master of Science ( la, Magisterii Scientiae; abbreviated MS, M.S., MSc, M.Sc., SM, S.M., ScM or Sc.M.) is a master's degree in the field of science awarded by universities in many countries or a person holding such a degree. In contrast to ...

with honours in 1987. Her masterate research, supervised by

Patricia Bergquist Dame Patricia Rose Bergquist (née Smyth, 10 March 1933 – 9 September 2009) was a New Zealand zoologist who specialised in anatomy and taxonomy. At the time of her death, she was professor emerita of zoology and honorary professor of anatomy ...

, was an investigation of the systematics and ecology of the sponges of Motupore Island in Papua New Guinea. The title of that thesis was ''Systematics and ecology of the sponges of Motupore Island, Papua New Guinea''. She then earned a

PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * ''Piled Higher and Deeper'', a web comic * Ph.D. (band), a 1980s British group ** Ph.D. (Ph.D. albu ...

at the

in 1991 under the joint supervision of Patricia and Peter Bergquist, with a thesis entitled, ''The order Hadromerida (Porifera: Demospongiae), taxonomy and relationships of the major families'', and in the same year (with Patricia Bergquist) published a paper on the genus, '' Tethya''.

Research career

From 1991 to 1992, Kelly was a post-doctoral fellow at the

Florida Atlantic University Florida Atlantic University (Florida Atlantic or FAU) is a Public university, public research university with its main campus in Boca Raton, Florida, and satellite campuses in Dania Beach, Florida, Dania Beach, Davie, Florida, Davie, Fort Lauderd ...

Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute, working with Shirley Pomponi, studying natural products extracted from deep-sea sponges and analysing DNA sequences. In 1994 she was collaborating with

at the

. From 1993, she spent four years with the

Natural History Museum, London The Natural History Museum in London is a museum that exhibits a vast range of specimens from various segments of natural history. It is one of three major museums on Exhibition Road in South Kensington, the others being the Science Museum an ...

, carrying out research on sponges in the Indo-Pacific, before returning to New Zealand and working as a senior scientist in the Department of Landscape and Plant Science at Unitec Institute of Technology in Auckland and a consultant to the Coral Reef Research Foundation in Micronesia. At some point she was affiliated with the University of Hawai'i System. By 2001, she was working at the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, in Auckland, where she continues to work (as of September 2021). Her zoological author abbreviations are Kelly-Borges, and Kelly. Kelly has described over 80 taxa and has had at least one sponge named for her ('' Abyssocladia kellyae''), "for her numerous contributions to sponge science, and her work on deep-sea carnivorous and non-carnivorous sponges from the SW Pacific". See also taxa named by Michelle Kelly. In 2011, Kelly was awarded the degree of

Doctor of Science Doctor of Science ( la, links=no, Scientiae Doctor), usually abbreviated Sc.D., D.Sc., S.D., or D.S., is an academic research degree awarded in a number of countries throughout the world. In some countries, "Doctor of Science" is the degree used f ...

by the University of Auckland, on the basis of her papers published since 1988 on the taxonomy, systematics and phylogeny of sponges.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kelly, Michelle 1961 births Living people People from Otago New Zealand expatriates in Papua New Guinea People educated at Te Aho o Te Kura Pounamu University of Auckland alumni New Zealand marine biologists New Zealand women scientists New Zealand taxonomists