Mapping biodiversity hotspotsMany important areas identified for conservation priorities focus on areas of high species richness, however, it is unclear whether these areas change depending on what aspect of richness is considered (e.g. evolutionary distinctiveness, endemicity, or threatened species). For this project, I studied the extent of spatial congruency for all sharks and rays globally between three species richness measures. This work highlights the importance of considering multiple metrics of biodiversity when making conservation management decisions.
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Abiotic and biotic drivers of biodiversityCurrently, I am working on synthesizing and analyzing the abiotic and biotic drivers of shark and ray biodiversity globally. These include testing hypotheses such as the kinetic energy, climate stability, and productivity hypotheses, as well as exploring the cradle-museum dichotomy of species distributions and how it's patterns are affected by environmental variables.
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Humpback whale foraging ecology and ship strike riskI worked with the Alaska Whale Foundation for four months in 2017 helping to analyze the relationship between the small-scale movement behavior of humpback whales and their physical environment. I also worked on analyzing and drafting a proposal for new shipping routes to minimize the ship-strike risk of humpback whales through the inside passage of the southeastern Alaskan panhandle.
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