Dr Wendy Nelson MNZM is currently a Professor of Biological Sciences at the University of Auckland and Principal Scientist - Marine Biology at the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research. She specialises in marine phycology, particularly the biosystematics of macroalgae of New Zealand, with research on floristics, evolution and phylogeny, as well as ecology, and life history studies. In 2016, she won the Royal Society of New Zealand Te Aparangi Hutton Medal, awarded for outstanding work by a researcher in New Zealand in the Earth, plant and animal sciences.