Oceanographer · Seagrass Mapping · Tampa Bay

I map what's disappearing
before it's gone.

PhD researcher using multibeam sonar and autonomous vessels to see seagrass meadows the way satellites can't — and writing about what it actually takes to do science while keeping a family afloat.

⋅˚₊‧ scientist, sailor, mostly-functional human ‧₊˚⋅

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The short version

I'm a PhD candidate at USF's College of Marine Science, where I spend most of my time staring at sonar data trying to understand how seagrass meadows are structured — and how we're losing them.

My research uses multibeam echosounders, the same acoustic technology used to map shipwrecks and the seafloor, to "see" seagrass canopy structure in water too murky for satellites or aerial photos to read clearly. I built the multibeam seagrass mapping protocol currently used at COMIT, mounted on an autonomous surface vessel I helped develop from the ground up.

Outside the lab: I'm a mom of two, a sometimes-sailor, and a slow, stubborn believer that good science and a full life aren't supposed to be in competition with each other — even when the system makes it feel that way.

Autonomous surface vessel deployed for seagrass mapping survey, Tampa Bay

ASV deployment — Tampa Bay survey day

Multibeam sonar classification map showing seagrass coverage in green over depth-coded water column

Multibeam classification — green = seagrass canopy

Field notes

2025

Seeing structure in the shallows

Bridging the resolution gap between sonar, video, and community-scale modeling of seagrass habitat. Presented at GEOHAB.

Conference talk

2023–24

Multispectral multibeam sonar for fine-scale habitat mapping

Developed and field-tested a methodology for using multifrequency multibeam acoustics to resolve seagrass canopy structure, in collaboration with USGS and the COMIT autonomous vessel program.

Dissertation research

2023

An Atlantis ecosystem model for the Gulf of Mexico, with updates to 2023

Co-authored NOAA technical memorandum contributing seagrass habitat affinity parameters to a whole-ecosystem model used in fisheries management.

NOAA Technical Memorandum

2025

Boat speed and manatee mortality, by way of citizen data

Used community-reported sightings to model how vessel speed affects collision risk for Florida manatees. Published in Ecological Solutions and Evidence.

Peer-reviewed publication

Writing

The Substack

Field notes from the parts of academic science nobody puts in the methods section — funding, motherhood, institutional politics, and what it actually takes to keep a research career afloat. Slow, salt-stung, and occasionally funny.

Read on Substack →

I map what's disappearingbefore it's gone.