My primary interests are the interactions between marine hosts and their symbionts. Often I investigate these interactions in response to anthropogenic impacts, such as climate change and pollution.
During my time as an undergraduate at Georgia Tech I assessed the microbial communities of oxygen minimum zones and corals, under ocean acidification and with algal contact. These experiences focused my interests on marine symbioses for my graduate studies. During my Master's work at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington, I worked to tease apart how the microbial communities of sponges aid the host and effect the cycling of nutrients within coral reef ecosystems, expanding my interests from host interactions to ecosystem-level functioning. I have continued to investigate host-symbiont interactions here at the University of Alabama at Birmingham by studying cnidarian associations with various microalgal symbionts (Symbiodiniaceae). My work utilizes a diverse toolset of host and symbiont physiology, gene expression, microbiome analyses, transcriptomics, energy reserves, and environmental data, to understand these interactions and to aid the management and restoration of these ecosystems.
Faculty Advisor: Dustin Kemp