Graduate Students

Hannah Elizabeth Blondin

Benjamin Burford

I earned my B.S. in field and wildlife biology from Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo in 2013. After graduation, I worked for the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute and the National Marine Fisheries Service in the respective fields of deep sea and anadromous fish ecology. In fall 2015, I enrolled in the Biology PhD program at Stanford University where my research utilizes in situ footage, scientific surveys, animal-borne data loggers, oceanographic data and molecular techniques to understand the migratory behaviors of ecologically and economically important Pacific squids and the environmental (...) Hiding in plain sight: Mimicry in a juvenile deep-sea squid

Rachel Crane

Rachel is interested in molluscan shell form. Animals’ shells defend them from a variety of environmental dangers and predatory attacks, including a multitude of low-magnitude, repeated stresses, which could cumulatively cause lethal fatigue damage. She studies how shell features—from composition and microstructure to overall morphology—contribute to fatigue resistance. By developing new mechanical techniques to test shell fatigue resistance, she hopes to answer questions about the evolution of shell shape and the ecological interactions between hard-shelled molluscs, their predators, and the (...) Rachel's Website

James Andrew Fahlbusch

Richard Grewelle

Richard Grewelle is a current PhD student motivated to understand ecological and evolutionary underpinnings of wildlife disease systems. Prior research areas involve bioinformatics, phylogenetics, and disease ecology. Although with previous experience in terrestrial diseases, including Y. pestis (plague), Richard pursues marine disease ecology due to the lack of knowledge surrounding systems we hardly encounter. Marine diseases present significant challenges to not only biologists; they may devastate fragile ecosystems supporting fisheries or providing ecological services. Richard works (...)

Shirel Kahane-Rapport

Elora H. López

Elora López is a Ph.D. candidate in Biology at Stanford University, based at the Hopkins Marine Station in Pacific Grove, CA. She uses genomics to address questions about the ecology, evolution, and conservation of marine life. Her research spans a wide range of topics, including coral bleaching recovery in American Samoa, somatic mutations in very long-lived organisms, and the effects of nuclear radiation on wildlife at Bikini Atoll, a former nuclear testing site in the Marshall Islands. López's first research expedition to Bikini Atoll was featured on the PBS documentary series Big Pacific (...)

Julia Mason

Crystal Ng

Elan Portner