Ray

My research focuses on using long-term monitoring data combined with statistical modeling to optimize coral restoration practices along the Florida reef tract. Disease and thermal anomalies have led to the degradation of the Florida reef tract. More specifically, since the outbreak of white-band disease in the 1970s, acroporids have undergone a 95% decline. The decline of these foundational species has incited coral restoration organizations to establish, implement, and improve restoration methods throughout the Florida reef tract. However, one of the challenges for coral restoration is to develop models that can accurately predict spatial variation in coral outplant survival at different spatial scales. There is an urgent need for models that can better predict optimal localities for coral outplanting to aid coral-restoration decisions and determine which species should be outplanted and where they should be outplanted along the Florida reef tract. My doctoral research uses both in situ data and large datasets previously collected by organizations and monitoring agencies to create decision-support modeling approaches and explore variables contributing to outplant survival.