Dr. Diele is a Reader in Marine Sciences at Edinburgh Napier University since 2012, with part-time secondment as Co-Director of Research at St Abbs Marine Station. She is a Napier's Research Lead for Animal and Plant Sciences and for Unit of Assessment 7, Research Exercise Framework. Karen is also an active member of the Marine Alliance for Science and Technology for Scotland (MASTS; www.masts.ac.uk). Before moving to Scotland, she was a researcher at the Leibniz Centre of Tropical Marine Ecology (ZMT) in Bremen, Germany, with projects in Brazil and Vietnam (2011-2006). Between 2000 and 2005 she was based in Northern Brazil as a postdoctoral fellow and then vice-coordinator of a 10 yrs. bilateral research project on Mangrove Dynamics and Management (MADAM - collaboration ZMT and Federal University of Pará), co-funded by the German BMBF (Federal Ministry of Education and Research) and the Brazilian CNPq/CAPES (National Counsel of Technological and Scientific Development / Ministry of Education). In 2000 she gained her Ph.D. degree in Biology at the University Bremen / ZMT, Germany.