Rebecca Rooney

Rebecca Rooney carries out research in wetland ecology and is a world expert on biomonitoring and wetland assessment.

Rebecca Rooney examines how human-caused and natural ecological disturbances influence wetland communities, including birds, invertebrates and plants. She tackles fundamental questions around how communities assemble and what defines them, including the relative importance of biological interactions, environmental conditions, and landscape factors. She is keenly interested in the role of rare species and novelty in ecological processes.

Her research supports the implementation of wetland policy, invasive species management, and the protection of species at risk. Her results improve the design of restored and reclaimed wetlands, provide tools for evaluating their integrity, and identifies the most successful techniques for invasive species control.

• Wetland ecology

• Aquatic plants

• Biomonitoring and ecosystem assessment

• Community Ecology

• Restoration Ecology

• Landscape Ecology

• Threats to Aquatic Ecosystems and their Interaction

• Contamination & Remediation: Water, Soil, Air

• Carbon Dioxide Capture and Storage

• Conservation

• Ecology and Environmental Biology

• Increasingly Complex Water Challenges

• Sustainable Water Use and Management

• Managing the Risk of Human Activity in Aquatic Ecosystems

• Legacies of Agriculture Pollutants

• 2011 Ph.D. Ecology, University of Alberta, Canada

• 2006 M.Sc. Entomology, University of Manitoba, Canada

• 2003 B.Sc. Environmental Science, Carleton University, Canada

• 2015 University of Waterloo Outstanding Performance Award

• 2010 Departmental Teaching Commendation, University of Alberta

• 2010 Lakshmi Memorial Teaching Award, University of Alberta

• 2010 First Place Student Presentation, Society of Wetland Scientists

• 2009 Bill Samuel Service Award, University of Alberta

• 2009 Alberta Ingenuity Graduate Scholarship

• 2009 Honorary Izaak Walton Killam Memorial Scholarship

• 2007 Graduate Scholarship, University of Alberta

• 2007 Ph.D. Scholarship, University of Alberta

• 2007 Postgraduate Scholarship- Doctoral, NSERC

• 2003 Senate Medal for Outstanding Performance, Carleton University

• 2003 Graduate Scholarship- CGSM, NSERC

• Canadian Co-Chair of the International Joint Commission’s Science Advisory Board – Research Coordination Committee

• Co-chair International Joint Commission Microplastics Monitoring and Risk Assessment Working Group

• Ontario Phragmites Working Group Member

• Department of Biology Curriculum Committee

• Department of Biology Graduate Student Committee

• President’s Sustainability Advisory Committee, Academics Working Group

• Co-founder Save Ontario Wetland

• International Association for Great Lakes Research

• Ecological Society of America

• Canadian Society for Ecology and Evolution

• Water Institute

• BIOL 150 - Organismal and Evolutionary Ecology
  • Taught in 2020, 2023
• BIOL 251 - Fundamentals of Ecology
  • Taught in 2024, 2025
• BIOL 485 - Conservation Biology
  • Taught in 2021, 2023, 2024

* Only courses taught in the past 5 years are displayed.

• Please see Rebecca Rooney's website for a current list of her peer-reviewed articles: https://uwaterloo.ca/rooney-lab/research/publications