Curtin’s BioBlitz program is establishing a biodiversity baseline for measuring ecosystem changes on our campus lands – and helping Curtin achieve our Nature Positive goals.
The inaugural BioBlitz was completed in early 2025, with 40 students using environmental DNA (eDNA) to discover the extent of biodiversity across the Curtin Perth and Curtin Singapore campuses.
With support from Curtin’s School of Molecular and Life Sciences, TrEnD Lab and eDNA Frontiers team, the students identified more than 3,000 species from air, water and surface samples taken from across the two campuses.
Image: Species identified in 2025 Curtin Bentley BioBlitz included bacteria, mammals, insects, plants and ciliates, many of which are too small to see without a microscope. Source – eDNA Frontiers and TrEnD Lab.
eDNA has the ability to identify the hard-to-spot species that can be missed in traditional sampling. At both Perth and Singapore, previously unseen Freshwater jellyfish were discovered. Sampling also identified the presence of two-toed earless skinks, brown honeyeaters and black cockatoos. At Curtin Singapore, students detected Asian small-clawed otters, Asian water monitors and palm civets.
The BioBlitz program will expand in 2026 to include Curtin Malaysia, and, in 2027, the aim is to have all six global campuses take part. The results of BioBlitz will establish a biodiversity baseline against which future changes in campus ecosystems can be measured, strengthening Curtin’s capacity to advance its Nature Positive goals.
Image: Student sampling eDNA at Curtin Bentley. Gloves are worn to prevent contamination from the collector’s skin cells, which could interfere with the DNA analysis and produce inaccurate results. Source – School of Molecular and Life Science, Curtin.
Curtin’s Nature Positive initiatives promote practices that can “restore and protect ecosystems and biodiversity, ensuring human activities contribute to net environmental improvement and ecological regeneration”, and represent one of the five themes of the University’s Sustainable Development Action Plan.
You can learn more about the benefits of eDNA at by listening to Curtin’s research podcast episode, The Future of eDNA.
