Sylvaine is a researcher at the Laboratory ECOMERS, CNRS-University of Nice Sophia Antipolis (UNS), France. Her current research focuses on assessing the effectiveness of Marine Protected Areas in the Mediterranean Sea. She is the Mediterranean project director of the PISCO - UNS booklet "The Science of Marine Protected Areas: Mediterranean Edition". She was recently awarded a French National Research Agency (ANR) fellowship which will allow her to lead the 3 year project "PAVIS: Assessing the relationships between Marine Protected Areas and invasive species". At the same time, she continues to contribute to CEED research as an associate member and through collaboration with researchers at the University of Queensland.
Sylvaine’s research interests include: marine spatial planning and prioritization of conservation actions in data poor areas; marine community ecology including the impacts of invasive species on native communities; marine protected areas as an ecosystem-management tool; and cumulative human impacts on food webs.