Emma Sutherland

2022 Weston Family Awards in Northern Research recipient

Master’s student
University of Manitoba

Emma is a master’s student at the University of Manitoba studying the migration of the Eastern Beaufort Sea beluga population in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region (ISR).

Located in Canada’s western Arctic, the ISR is the most western of the four Inuit homelands in Canada. It spans more than 90,000 square km and includes the Beaufort Sea, the Mackenzie River delta, the Yukon North Slope and the northwest portion of the Northwest Territories.

Eastern Beaufort Sea beluga whales are abundant in the ISR and are of high importance to its communities. Emma is aiming to understand how these ice-dependent top predators are evolving their migratory strategies to adapt to a changing environment.

By combining several decades of telemetry data with modern geospatial tools and statistical approaches, she is identifying specific environmental drivers that have led to shifts in beluga whale migration patterns.

Learn more about the Weston Family Awards in Northern Research.