Biological Sciences: Marine Biology - PhD
Research Topic: The effect of thermal stress on gene expression and oxidative stress of non-native colonial tunicates within the Gulf of Maine
My research will focus on the dominant non-native ascidian Botryllodies violaceus, and understanding how climatic variances will alter the physiological and genetic response of this species through oxidative stress and the expression (up-regulation, down-regulation) of heat-shock proteins.
The Gulf of Maine (GOM) is experiencing some of the fastest rates of warming, resulting in a loss of its subarctic characteristics. Due to these rising temperatures, cold water species are being faced with the challenge of success. Ascidians (Phylum Chordata, Subphylum Tunicata), are a diverse group of organisms with many species being known to be non-native in fragments of their described habitats. Tunicates are dominant members of the GOM subtidal community and are an evolutionary link to the chordate subphylum vertebrata.
Many genes that present themselves in multiples within vertebrates appear in the ascidian genome as single homolog genes. The compact genome of ascidians allows for their cell lineage to be fully defined (something that can not always be done in more evolutionary advanced chordates).
Ascidians provide an excellent model organism for both invertebrate and vertebrate species and can provide a genetic template for species that fall into both of these groups.
