Walther Fish Ecology Lab
Image credits: B. Walther, J. Mohan, M. Seeley, B. Cutler, S. Smith, A. Montalvo.
News
Recruiting a PhD student for Fall 2025!
We are recruiting a new PhD student to begin in Fall 2025! Interested students should send:
(1) a CV
(2) copies of unofficial transcripts and
(3) a cover letter describing experience, potential research interests, and general career goals
to Dr. Benjamin Walther at benjamin.walther@tamucc.edu by November 15th 2024. A full application to the university will be subsequently required for priority admissions consideration before DECEMBER 1st 2024. More information about the position can be found HERE.
Jacob Oster received a prestigious Science Policy Fellowship from the National Academies of Sciences! He will be working with the Water Institute in New Orleans, LA. Check out more information here!
The website for our new hypoxia project is live! Check out the Project Breathless website here.
We've been funded for the next phase of our hypoxia research by the National Science Foundation! The new "Project Breathless" will expand the use of otolith chemistry to evaluate hypoxia exposure and weave in isotopes, mercury, and even eye lens analyses! Check out the news story about our grant here.
We have a collaborative project investigating American Eel in Texas. Check out the story here.
About the lab
Our lab conducts research on a variety of topics related to fish ecology, migration, habitat use, food web interactions and environmental stressors. This work generally focuses on using the “natural tag” properties of carbonate hard parts in marine and diadromous fishes to examine patterns of migration, exposure to environmental stressors, and life history dynamics of species with mobile phases. We often couple otolith chemistry with other techniques such as tissue stable isotopes to examine food web responses. This field has grown exponentially in the past couple of decades, yet significant unknowns remain about highly migratory or dispersive species, particularly in the marine environment. Otolith chemistry has the potential to reveal key information about identity and movement patterns that is essential for the effective management of exploited species and ecosystems.
We are located at Texas A&M University - Corpus Christi in the Department of Life Sciences. We work closely with members of the University of Texas Jackson School of Geosciences, which houses an array of analytical instruments including laser ablation ICP-MS (multiple and single collectors), TIMS, and isotope ratio mass spectrometers.
Visit the page subsections for more information about our specific projects, lab members and opportunities to work in our lab.
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