Research Interests

Research interests are in nutrient cycling and primary production in tropical marine ecosystems and stressors that influence tropical plant communities. 

We are currently focused on climate change impacts including upper temperature and salinity limits of marine plant communities and changes in partial pressure of CO2. We examine stress responses from the physiological and molecular scale , consider life history strategies of individual species and life-stage, as well as focus on ecosystem-level indicators of stress, such as hypoxia.  In addition to direct plant responses to stress, we are also interested in biogeochemical changes at the ecosystem-scale that can destabilize plant communities and  influence the sustainability of foundation plant communities that support marine ecosystems.  The majority of our work is in shallow tropical carbonate environments of South Florida, The Bahamas and wider Caribbean. We typically take an experimental approach to examine several alternative hypotheses in mesocosms and under field settings. Individual research projects are detailed under the “research” link.