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Jennifer Smith I grew up surrounded by water…I think I learned how to swim before I learned to walk. My father was a competitive swimmer and diver in college and although he didn't continue competing beyond college, the water was always an important and integral component of his everyday life. As a child I spent my summers traveling and camping throughout California. My dad built our first boat when I was 3 or 4 years old and I waterskiing by the time I was 5. I have always loved the water and the ocean but didn't realize that I wanted to be a marine biologist until I was in college. After spending 2 years working on an environmental engineering degree at Humboldt State University in northern California, I decided to take a SCUBA class. My first day of diving was spent in the kelp forests of Monterey in 1993 and I knew from that moment on that I wanted to study the ocean. I immediately switched my major to marine biology and signed myself up for as many diving courses as I could find. I took scientific diving for 3 semesters in row with Dr. Phil Buttolph who allowed our small class to design and conduct research projects on anything we were interested in. This flexibility and the expertise and confidence I gained while diving on the coast of the pacific northwest in conjunction with the rigorous education I received while working under Dr. Gary Brusca helped to define my career. I spent a year as a national exchange student at the University of Hawaii, Hilo where I was lucky enough to spend every day on the water. My first marine botany class taught by Dr. Karla McDermid at UH Hilo. She introduced me to the wide range of problems facing tropical reefs including algal blooms and the loss of diversity, overfishing, eutrophication and the introduction of alien species. After leaving UH Hilo, I knew I wanted to study marine botany in graduate school and attempt to resolve some of these pressing issues. I then graduated from Humboldt State with a double degree (Marine Biology and Zoology) in 1997. I began graduate school in the department of botany at the University of Hawaii Manoa in 1997 working with Dr.'s Celia Smith, Cynthia Hunter and Isabella Abbott. Most of my research as a graduate student has focused on attempting to determine the effects of various herbivore groups on algal community structure and how different levels of nitrogen and phosphorus effect community development. I spent the first 2 years designing and implementing a large ecosystem level experiment funded by the Hawaii Coral Reef Initiative Research Program investigating the effects of overfishing and increased nutrients on benthic reef community structure. The early findings of this research will be published in a special issue of the journal of Coral Reefs regarding algal dynamics on tropical reefs. I have since been part of many surveys and monitoring programs throughout the state of Hawaii including the remote northwest Hawaiian Islands. My most recent work seeks document and map (using GIS) the distribution of all of the alien species of algae in Hawaii and to experimentally determine the unique characteristics of these species which allow them to be competitively dominant. This is my third mission to NURC. I will be serving as the alternate diver for the Aquarius-so if any of the Aquanauts get sick or does not make it in for any reason, I will take their place. Relevant Publications:
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