Field Research

We routinely conduct field research projects capturing live forams for culture experiments or capturing recently alive forams to establish the geochemistry of modern specimens. We've recently expanded this work to study the effects of marine heat waves on foraminifera ecology (their assemblages) and are conducting genotyping and metabarcoding analyses to establish symbiont/microbial associations. Follow the links below to learn more about a few of our past and present projects:

Field work on the Oregon Coast:
Since arriving at OSU in 2016, most of my Oregon-based field work has taken place on short (5-14 day) research cruises, funded either by my own grants or through 'cruises of opportunity' (we have been lucky to tag along on research cruises coordinated by colleagues and collaborators). I was recently funded to deploy 2 sediment traps off the coast of Oregon, will service the traps every 6 months for the next several years, and collect samples along the Newport Hydrographic Line. As part of these projects, members of my lab have sailed on the R/V Sikuliak, the R/V Oceanus, the R/V Elakha, the R/V Sally Ride, the R/V Sproul, and the F/V NOAA Bell M. Shimada. On occasion, we sample in the estuaries for benthic forams too! Learn more about our Coastal Oregon projects here.

Field work on Catalina Island
My first field season took place on Catalina Island at the Wrigley Institute of Marine Science in 2011. As part of my post-doc, we had additional field seasons in 2013 through 2016. We mostly conducted experiments on deeper dwelling forams, but several small projects included spinose species. My group returned to Catalina for a 3 week field season in 2022 and 5 weeks in 2023. Learn more about our ​Catalina Island projects here.

Field work on Green Island, Taiwan:
In May 2019, my lab group traveled to Green Island, Taiwan to diversify the species we study in the culture setting beyond those we typically find off the West Coast of US (where most of my field work has taken place). Learn more about our Taiwan projects here.
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Select projects

• Field research with living forams for proxy development, to study microbial/symbiont associations, and biomin
• Barium in non-spinose foraminifera: culture experiments and proxy development.
• Laser-ablation ICP-MS method development projects
• Reconstructing upper water column hydrography using multiple species of planktic foraminifera (Post doc research)
• Electron microprobe image maps of the Mg/Ca ratio in G. ruber and N. dutertrei (PhD research)
• Carbonate ion concentration in the ocean (proxy development, PhD research)