Rate My Professor Adam Kessler

Dr. Adam Kessler is a Senior Lecturer and Senior Teaching Fellow/Education Chair in the School of Earth, Atmosphere and Environment, Faculty of Science, at Monash University. He holds a BSc with First Class Honours in Chemistry and a PhD in Biogeochemistry from Monash University. Promoted to Senior Lecturer effective July 1, 2025, he coordinates and teaches SCI1300 (Climate Change: From Science to Society) and EAE2011 (Environmental Problem Solving and Visualisation, co-taught with Anja Slim). Kessler accepts PhD students and supervises honours and undergraduate projects in biogeochemistry.

As a biogeochemist, Kessler investigates nutrient dynamics involving carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, and iron in aquatic environments, with a focus on estuaries, coastal sands, and permeable sediments. His research addresses fermentation in low-oxygen coastal sands and its role in coral reef resilience to ocean acidification; nitrogen cycling pathways in estuarine sediments influenced by agricultural runoff, including denitrification, dissimilatory nitrate reduction to ammonium, and nitrous oxide production; and bioirrigation by hypoxia-tolerant burrowing fauna such as polychaetes. He has produced over 30 peer-reviewed publications, including 'Molecular hydrogen in seawater supports growth of diverse marine bacteria' (Nature Microbiology, 2023), 'Microorganisms oxidize glucose through distinct pathways in permeable and cohesive sediments' (The ISME Journal, 2024), 'Hydrodynamics Control Nitrous Oxide Production in Eutrophic Coastal Permeable Sediments' (Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences, 2024), and 'Pulses of labile carbon cause transient decoupling of fermentation and respiration in permeable sediments' (Limnology and Oceanography, 2023). His scholarship has accumulated over 1,850 citations. Kessler received the Interdisciplinary Seed Fund in 2018 from the Faculties of Engineering, IT, and Science. His projects support UN Sustainable Development Goals 2, 11, 13, 14, and 15, including 'Water Mining: Recovering economic quantities of metals from polluted rivers' (2020–2025).