November 11, 2021, by Alex McCarrel

Sitka Sound Science Center Announces 2021/2022 Scientist in Residency Fellows

The Sitka Sound Science Center is pleased to announce the Scientists in Residency Fellows for 2021/2022. The Sitka Sound Science Center, through funding from Alaska NSF EPSCoR (National Science Foundation Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research), has selected four Scientist in Residency Fellowship (SIRF) participants for 2021/2022. The SIRF program brings scientists to Sitka for one-month sabbaticals to allow scientists time to work undisturbed by their usual daily routine and provide them with community engagement opportunities to share their research and to learn from our community. This year’s SIRF fellows are an impressive group of scientists from some of the nation’s premier scientific establishments. They are:

February 2022: Courtney Hart is a PhD candidate at the College of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences at University of Alaska Fairbanks. Currently, her research draws on collaborative partnerships with commercial shellfish divers and growers, Alaska Native tribal entities, state, and not-for-profit organizations to investigate the interaction between harmful algal blooms and economically or culturally important shellfish species. Ms. Hart hopes to incorporate her biological and ecological skillset to develop modern and equitable management solutions for coastal fisheries stakeholders.

April 2022: Julie Schram recently joined the University of Alaska Southeast (UAS) Natural Science department as an Assistant Professor of Animal Physiology after finishing a Postdoctoral Fellowship with the Coastal Trophic Ecology Lab at the University of Oregon. She is working on projects that utilize fatty acids (the building blocks of lipids) to better understand invertebrate feeding ecology. Julie has taken an integrated approach to understanding how our changing climate may influence the ecologically and economically important species humans rely on.

September 2022: Joanna Young is a Postdoctoral Fellow in University of Alaska Fairbanks’ International Arctic Research Center where she studies Alaska glacier mass loss in a changing climate. Originally from Ontario, Canada, Joanna obtained both her Masters and PhD in Geophysics from the University of Alaska Fairbanks. She also serves as Director of the Alaska branch of Inspiring Girls Expeditions, free science, art and outdoor experiences for high school girls and gender-expansive youth. Joanna is especially interested in understanding the impacts of glacier loss on downstream ecosystems and communities, such as Sitka.

Mid-October 2022: Scott Gabara is a postdoctoral researcher in the marine biology department within the College of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences at University of Alaska Fairbanks based in Juneau. Currently, Scott works on the impacts of glacial melt on nearshore marine communities, where he hopes to better predict how melting glaciers will affect marine flora and fauna. This information could be used by harvesters, aquaculture farmers, and the scientific community to better understand where and when glacier melt will affect the ocean and the people that rely on it.

For more detail about these scientists and the SIRF program please see our website www.sitkascience.org. To schedule an event with a SIRF Fellow or for more information please contact Alex McCarrel, SIRF Coordinator, at 907-747-8878 ext 7.