Coastal Community Ecology

Our lab explores patterns of biodiversity, species interactions, and ecosystem function in coastal ecosystems (e.g., coral reefs, rocky intertidal) and how humans are altering these ecosystems through stressors like climate change and overfishing. We combine field observations and experiments with data synthesis to ask fundamental questions in community ecology that can then inform conservation and management. We are based out of the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa in the School of Life Sciences.

We acknowledge that the ‘āina (land, earth) on which our lab is based - the ahupuaʻa (land division from mountain to sea) of Waikīkī, in the moku (district) of Kona, on the mokupuni (island) of Oʻahu - is part of the larger territory recognized by Kanaka ʻŌiwi (Indigenous Hawaiians) as their ancestral grandmother, Papahānaumoku. We recognize that her majesty Queen Lili‘uokalani yielded the Hawaiian Kingdom and these territories under duress and protest to the United States to avoid the bloodshed of her people. We further recognize that Hawai‘i remains an illegally occupied state of America.