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Brian Helmuth, Ph.D. Like all marine biologists, I grew up fascinated with the ocean. As my family can attest, this obsession frequently had some very smelly consequences. For example, there was the incident that occurred when I tried to smuggle a dead horseshoe crab home in the trunk of our car (a feat which was discovered via the smell emanating from our car in the 100° weather); or the unfortunate episode where my pet crayfish initiated a death march from their tank and into my father's shoes. My fate was sealed, however, when I started diving in high school. I began my diving career over 18 years ago, exploring nineteenth century canal boat wrecks in the Finger Lakes of upstate New York with Mr. Ron Hynes. I then discovered environmental research as an undergraduate at Cornell University, where I received his B.S. in 1989. There I worked as an undergraduate research assistant for Dr. Drew Harvell. It was then that I had my first encounter with Aquarius, when I saturated as part of Dr. Harvell's team at the previous habitat site in St. Croix. I then completed a Masters Degree at Northeastern University under the direction of Dr. Kenneth Sebens, with whom I still maintain an active collaboration. My Master's Thesis project, conducted in Jamaica, examined the roles of colony shape in determining rates of particle capture by the coral Agaricia. After completing my MS in 1991, I moved to the University of Washington in Seattle to begin a Ph.D. under the direction of Dr. Tom Daniel. Here my work focused on the use of engineering techniques to study the interface between organisms and their environment, both in the rocky intertidal of the Pacific Northwest, and in coral reef environments. After receiving my doctorate in 1997, I completed a two-year post-doctoral fellowship at Stanford University's Hopkins Marine Station in Pacific Grove, California, under the direction of Dr. Mark Denny. I began a position as an assistant professor at the University of South
Carolina in 1999. My current work focuses not only on the physiology,
hydrodynamics and ecology of coral reefs, but also on the effects of climate
change on the physiology and ecology of intertidal invertebrates. I presently
live in Camden, South Carolina with my wife, Briana Timmerman, who is
the education coordinator for the South Carolina Department of Natural
Resource's Land, Water and Conservation Division. For more information
on any of the research or public outreach programs being conducted in
my lab, please contact me at any of the above addresses. Selected references: Helmuth B. 1999. Thermal biology of rocky intertidal mussels: quantifying body temperatures using climatological data. Ecology 80(1): 15-34. Denny MW, B Gaylord, B Helmuth and TL Daniel. 1998. The menace of momentum: dynamic forces on flexible organisms. Limnol. Oceanogr. 43:955- 968. Helmuth BST. 1998. Intertidal mussel microclimates: Predicting the body temperature of a sessile invertebrate. Ecol. Monogr., 68 (1):29-52. Sebens KP, SP Grace, B Helmuth, EA Maney, Jr. and JS Miles 1998. Water flow and prey capture by three scleractinian corals, Madracis mirabilis, Montastrea cavernosa and Porites porites in a field enclosure. Mar. Biol. 131:347-360. Daniel TL, BS Helmuth, WB Saunders, and PD Ward. 1997. Septal complexity in ammonoid cephalopods increased mechanical risk and limited depth. Paleobiology, 23:470-481. Helmuth BST, KP Sebens and TL Daniel. 1997. Morphological variation in coral aggregations: branch spacing and mass flux to coral tissues. J. Exp. Mar. Biol. Ecol., 209: 233-259. Helmuth BST, BEH Timmerman, and KP Sebens. 1997. Interplay of host morphology and symbiont microhabitat in coral aggregations. Mar. Biol., 130:1- 10. Sebens KP, J Witting, and B Helmuth, 1997. Effects of water flow and branch spacing on particle capture by the reef coral Madracis mirabilis (Duchassaing and Michelotti). J. Exp. Mar. Biol. Ecol., 211:1-28. Helmuth B and KP Sebens. 1993. The influence of colony morphology and orientation to flow on particle capture by the scleractinian coral Agaricia agaricites (Linnaeus). J. Exp. Mar. Biol. Ecol. 165: 251-278. |
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