Dr Larissa Schneider is a Research Fellow at the Australian National University at the Department of Archaeology and Natural History. Her research uses deposited lake sediments as archives of past mercury contamination to understand the natural cycle of mercury and how humans have increased mercury emissions since the start of the Industrial Revolution. The results of her research inform decision-making on mercury contamination in Australia.

Dr Schneider received her PhD from the University of Canberra, where she studied the fate of metals released by coal-fired power stations in estuaries of New South Wales. Upon her PhD completion, Dr Schneider was appointed as a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Australian National University, where she built a geochemistry facility within the Palaeoworks Laboratory, including the purchase of instruments to analyse mercury and the development of analytical methods for mercury analyses using different matrixes.

In addition to her scientific work, she has published articles on the interactions between science, policy and regulations on mercury, in particular focusing on efforts to better regulate mercury emissions by coal-fired power station in Australia. Dr Schneider is currently working on establishing the main climate drivers and anthropogenic events to affect mercury fluxes in the Southern Hemisphere.