Rate My Professor Sonja Dominik

Dr. Sonja Dominik is a Principal Research Scientist at CSIRO Agriculture and Food, where she leads the workpackage on "Verifying credentials" within the Trusted Agrifood Export Mission, contributing to the goal of increasing Australia's agrifood exports by $10 billion by 2023 by enhancing trust in safety, quality, and provenance. She serves as Target area lead for sustainability credentials and standards, providing high-level science leadership to advance environmental, social, and economic benefits for global market access. Previously, she acted as Research Director for Livestock and Aquaculture and led the Sustainability and Welfare, and Genetics and Genomics groups within the Livestock and Aquaculture Program. Dominik earned her PhD in Animal Genetics and Breeding from the University of New England in 2001 and a Diplom Agrar Ingenieur from Justus-Liebig University, Giessen, Germany, in 1996. Her research focuses on animal breeding and genetics, developing phenotypically complex novel traits, physiological drivers of adaptation and environment interactions, and improved breeding methodologies for species including Atlantic salmon, abalone, prawns, oysters, sheep, and cattle. Recent efforts include cost-effective genomic technologies for livestock and traits such as methane emissions in sheep, breech flystrike resistance, and immune competence in cattle to support industry sustainability.

Dominik is an internationally recognized expert whose R&D has delivered advancements across complex traits. She has co-edited multiple Breeding Focus conference proceedings published by the University of New England, including Breeding Focus 2016 – Improving Welfare (2016), Breeding Focus 2018 – Reducing Heat Stress (2018), and Breeding Focus 2021 – Improving Reproduction (2021). Notable publications include "Immune competence traits assessed during the stress response in beef cattle" (Hine et al., 2019), "The distribution of SNP marker effects for faecal worm egg count in sheep" (Kemper et al., 2011), and "Chromosomal differences between European and North American Atlantic salmon" (Brenna-Hansen et al., 2012). In 2019, she was named a Superstar of STEM by Science & Technology Australia. With over 60 scientific publications and more than 1,300 citations, her work has significant impact on agricultural genetics and sustainability.