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Crocodile Hunter Steve Irwin has been posthumously awarded an adjunct professorship by the University of Queensland, a day before he's remembered on Steve Irwin Day.
Irwin's wife Terri was presented with the award from the university's School of Integrative Biology tonight while father Bob Irwin and staff from Australia Zoo watched on.
"I think that this would be such a tremendous honour to Steve," she said.
"This will be something the Irwin family will treasure forever."
She said that while she was proud of what her husband had achieved, she was excited about the future of the research project he had helped start.
The presentation followed a public lecture by Irwin's friend and colleague Professor Craig Franklin focusing on Irwin's contribution to crocodile research, including a project which tracked crocodiles' underwater movements from space.
He said the groundbreaking project had discovered wide travelling patterns - up to 900km - and that crocodiles had highly developed instincts which allowed them to find their way home after being relocated hundreds of kilometres away.
Prof Franklin said many of Irwin's fans underestimated just how much he had really contributed to conservation.
He said Irwin had "a long history" of publishing research papers and journals, and had even discovered a new breed of turtle - named Elseya Irwinii - in Queensland's Burdekin River 10 years ago.
Irwin had also achieved the extraordinary feat of being awarded an Australia Research Council linkage grant, he said.
"They're highly prestigious ... and that's quite something for someone who's outside of academia to be named investigator on such a grant," he said.
Tonight's award was a pre-amble to tomorrow's Steve Irwin Day celebrations, which will centre on the Irwins' Australia Zoo on the Sunshine Coast.
The day has been set aside to remember Irwin, who died when he was stabbed by a stingray barb while filming an underwater documentary off the north Queensland coast.
Thousands of fans will join the Irwin family at a special tribute concert where his nine-year-old daughter Bindi will perform three new songs and Olivia Newton-John will also sing.
Terri Irwin will launch her new book, My Steve, as well as a yet-to-be-revealed "special tribute" to her late husband.
- AAP
