Award for NOAA C&GC Fellow
Congratulations to one of our NOAA Climate and Global Change Fellows, Danielle Claar, who just won the Canadian Governor General’s Gold Medal Award for outstanding dissertation!
Danielle’s work is about understanding the mechanisms of ecosystem resilience. She works to further our knowledge of interactions between humans and coral reef ecosystems in order to better inform conservation of coral reefs in a changing environment. This is done by conducting research expeditions, using statistical modelling to disentangle large data sets, and implementing genomic and bioinformatic approaches to support conservation decisions.
Dr. Claar finished her Ph.D. with the Baum Lab at the University of Victoria, where her thesis research focused on how human and environmental impacts can affect interactions between corals and their symbiotic algae (Symbiodinium). She was recently awarded the Canadian Governor General’s Gold Medal Award for outstanding dissertation for her PhD dissertation on “Coral Symbioses Under Stress: Spatial and Temporal Dynamics of Coral-Symbiodinium Interactions.”
As a NOAA Climate and Global Change Postdoctoral Scholar in the Wood Lab at the University of Washington her research focuses on using coral reef fish parasites as bioindicators of environmental change. Specifically, how oceanographic drivers during the 2015/2016 El Niño influenced fish-associated parasite assemblages with her project “A rising tide of marine disease? Large- scale climatic drivers of parasitism in coral reef fishes.” This work will provide vital information needed to sustainably manage climate impacts on marine ecosystems and to assist coastal communities with adaptation to climate change.
Congratulations Dr. Claar and all the best to you in your important research. Get a more in-depth look at her work here.
