Category: Lab Alumni

STRI Short Term Fellow and Postdoc at University of the Ryukyus

I am a postdoctoral researcher broadly interested in understanding the influence of environmental conditions to the geographical distribution of species in the past, present, and future. During my Ph.D. research at the University of the Ryukyus, I have used molecular and stable isotope analyses to explore the evolution and ecology of zoanthids at a macroecological scale.

While in the O’Dea Lab, I will conduct surveys to document the distribution of zoanthids along both coasts of Panama. Additionally, I will identify their symbionts and estimate the trophic niche of zoanthid sibling species between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. With this research, we will be able to better understand how the Isthmus split influenced the evolution of symbiotic interactions and feeding modes.

STRI Intern

I am studying a Masters in Biodiversity and Conservation of Marine Ecosystems at the Sorbonne University in Paris. My project at STRI is to use ancient DNA to explore millennial scale changes in biodiversity of coral reefs. I am also keen on diving, surfing and dancing. Travel is another interest, and I am often curious about discovering new countries and traditions.

 

STRI Fellow

I am a micropaleontologist with a specialty in marine ostracods. I did my PhD in the University of Hong Kong. I love being on a research vessel, searching for answers in the vast ocean, and working with many scientists from diverse backgrounds. I am broadly interested in how species originated, distributed or went extinct in response to paleoenvironmental changes. Ostracods is a large class of bivalved crustaceans with a wide variety of ecological preferences, and is useful in paleoecological studies. In the STRI, I will be reconstructing the ostracod faunal changes during the emergence of the Panama Isthmus to shed light on the vulnerability of benthic meiofauna to environmental shifts.

www.researchgate.net/profile/Huai_Hsuan_Huang

Note: May will soon defend her Phd in the lab of Moriaki Yasuhara

Lab Manager

I am an environmental biologist from Panama, interested in understanding how coastal marine ecosystems respond to human-induced perturbations, and how to apply this knowledge to conservation and management strategies.

STRI Fellow

I am working on a project with Dr. Chien-Hsiang Lin that uses otolith assemblages to investigate the life histories of holocene reef fish. I am searching for patterns in the sizes of these assemblages over time, space and habitat. Through the study of otolith assemblages, we hope to contribute information to what coral reef fish communities were like in a time before human influence. This information can be compared to present reefs and can shape our ideas about ecosystem conservation.

I graduated from Boston University with a B.A. in marine science and biology, then spent a year as an Americorps after-school educator before I joined STRI as a research assistant. My personal interests lie at the intersection of research and community-driven conservation. I hope to explore marine ecological questions while supporting connections to the natural world through citizen science outreach.

SENACYT & STRI intern

I am a student of Marine Biology at the International Maritime University of Panama. I have previously worked on the ​​taxonomy,  identification and ecology of coral reef fish. I am currently working on a project that seeks to create the first collection of micro-gastropods in Panama, and at the same time investigate the variability in time and space of these organisms on a geological scale at the Caribbean and Pacific side of Panama to understand environmental changes. My primary goal as a marine biologist is to help develop science in Panama to help preserve the natural world.

STRI Short Term Fellow and doctoral student at PSU

Alexis’ Personal webpage

I am a Biology Ph.D. graduate student in George (PJ) Perry’s Anthropological Genomics Lab at Penn State University. My dissertation research is focused on integrating morphological and evolutionary genomics techniques to characterize how human behavior impacts non-human evolutionary biology.

I am working with Aaron at STRI to collect modern, archaeological, and paleontological shell materials from Bocas del Toro. Strombus pugilis is a species of conch that has decreased in body size at maturity over the past ~7000 years possibly due to size-selective human subsistence pressures. I’ll export these shell samples, along with some modern tissue samples, back to PSU and attempt to extract and sequence both modern and ancient DNA from these materials.

One long-term goal is to perform a genome-wide association study (GWAS) to identify genetic loci associated with body size variation in these marine snails. These loci could then be studied with evolutionary population genomic methods to test the hypothesis that small body size has evolved via a history of positive natural selection. If ancient DNA can be extracted and sequenced from the archaeo- and paleontological sites, it will be possible to directly track the evolutionary history of size-associated genetic variants over time, relative to genetic variants from other regions of the genome.

SENACYT & STRI Post-doctoral Fellow

My research sits between the established disciplines of biodiversity, ecology, chemical ecology and mineralogy in the context of the global change using bryozoans as model organisms.

My current research aims are (a) to present new data on bryozoan species richness and the spatial patterns from poorly known regions, (b) to evaluate the ecological and applied effects of their natural compounds and (c) to deepen current understanding of skeletal geochemistry so that we can assess better how they will respond to global change.

Why study bryozoans?

Bryozoans are ubiquitous and important members of many benthic communities with high productivity, biodiversity and many ecosystem services and their global species richness is still largely underestimated. Biodiversity and biogeographical baseline studies are starting points for monitoring and rapidly assessing changes associated with threats such as climate change and the establishment of invasive marine species.

They inhabit depths between the intertidal to abyssal plains, and at all latitudes in the oceans. The broad bathymetrical and geographic ranges of some species make them useful organisms for evaluating depth and/or geographical-related changes.

They are known to produce natural products (NPs), such as alkaloids and terpenoids, although research in NPs and their role in an ecological context have focused mostly on other phyla.

They are often dominant skeletal-carbonate producers in temperate and polar waters that secrete skeletal calcite containing significant amounts of Mg-calcite. Their skeletons are more soluble than skeletons with low Mg content, and consequently, more susceptible to ocean acidification, as the solubility of calcite increases with its Mg-calcite content.

STRI Intern

Nicte-Ha did her master’s  degree in marine biology at Reefs System Unit, UNAM, Mexico. There, she investigated the growth rates of fossil and modern corals as proxies to understand environmental change.

As an intern scientist of the O’Dea lab, Nicte-Ha expects to  gain a wider perspective on how the study of past marine environments can help to develop better strategies for conservation of current coral reef ecosystems that are under the current effects of human impacts.

Nicte has now moved on to the Altieri lab

STRI Post-doctoral Fellow

I am a taxonomist and primarily use fish otoliths to explore systematic and ecological questions. Much of my work uses sea bottom otolith assemblages as a study system, but I also work on fossil materials to address their paleoecological, biogeographical and evolutionary aspects.

 

 

Intern (STRI and University of Panama)

 

Intern (STRI and College of the Atlantic)

I am an undergraduate student at College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, Maine, pursuing a degree in Human Ecology with a concentration in marine biology. I am interested in the ecological relationship between sea turtles and the communities in which they belong. Subsequently, I hope to make further contributions to the restoration and conservation of both in my homeland, Malaysia.

At STRI I am assisting Mauro Lepore in quantifying the differences in community composition between fossil reefs and sub-recent reefs in Bocas del Toro. This internship will provide me with a new perspective to approach marine conservation: how the study of marine historical ecology can be utilized to better inform coral reef restoration and conservation efforts.

STRI fellow

2000 years of ecological change in Caribbean sponge communities: Project

Nicte has now moved on to the Altieri lab

Soy biólogo y paleontologo marino y los moluscos son mi gran pasión. Utilizo la taxonomía como una herramienta para identificar cientos de estos animales, tanto del registro fósil como modernos. Me interesan las interacciones ecológicas, depredador-presa en función del hábitat y los efectos antopocénicos sobre el medio ambiente, desde el punto de vista de conservación.El enfoque que utiliza el proyecto es súper interesante, ya podemos ir al pasado usando la paleontología; saber cómo eran los ambientes, que especies dominaban y que ha cambiado.

 

STRI Intern

Soy Bióloga egresada de la Universidad de Panamá con orientación a la biología animal. Estoy realizando una pasantía que va enfocada específicamente a la clasificación de los moluscos utilizando muestras de la costa del Pacífico así como del Caribe. En este proyecto manipulare organismos del registro fósil como modernos, separando las especies según caracteres morfológicos que me ayudaran a inferir entre familias y géneros. Teniendo en cuenta que los moluscos son un grupo muy diverso y complejo y el cual ha sufrido un proceso evolutivo muy interesante a lo largo de todo este tiempo.

STRI Intern

My interests lie in geology and paleoecology, specifically the structure, constitution, behaviour, and evolution of physical processes and how they interact with biology. I am working with Erin Dillon to process fossil and modern reef sediments from the Dominican Republic for her shark dermal denticle project. Through this opportunity, I hope to gain experience in the lab and learn more about microfossils and their application in interpreting environmental change over time, which will assist my future academic studies in paleoecology.

 

STRI Intern

I am a student at Keiser University in Nicaragua who will be transferring to FIU this year to pursue a degree in Marine Biology. I am working alongside Erin Dillon helping process fossil and modern sediment samples to find shark denticles and formulate a hypothesis of how shark communities were before humans. This will allow me to explore new areas of marine biology and gain experience doing research. It will also help me understand how fossils can be used to interpret the present.

STRI and Texas A&M Postdoctoral fellow

My research interest are: (1) Relating community structure over broad spatial, environmental and temporal scales; (2) Historical interactions between natural variability, biota and humans; (3) Reconstruct past environmental conditions using stable isotope ratios of modern and fossil mollusc specimens; (4) Design, construct, test and maintain useable databases and web-systems and (5) Marine macro- and micro- gastropod biodiversity and taxonomy.

The diverse temporal time-scales (modern to geological), spatial habitat differences in temperate, tropical and subtropical areas and the complexity of the organisms I have studied in the past (macro and micro gastropods, corals, sponges, crustaceans), provides an excellent background to conduct innovative research and integrate macroecology and palaeoecology. Thus, my current research focuses on integrating new and existing geochemical data with paleobiological data from the Panama Paleontology Project (PPP) to resolve the drivers of ecological change and evolutionary turnover in the Caribbean. In collaboration with Dr. Ethan Grossman (Texas A&M) I have built a relational database ‘Tropical Ocean Database’ that will be available  to unite paleoecology, evolutionay, environmental and geochemical datasets to allow broad-scale comparison and analysis of marine ecosystems and their communities through time.