Staff
Gabrielle Pantoni
|
Gabby is our lab manager and has been in the lab since joining in 2021 as a research technician before becoming a master's student in 2022. She completed her M.Sc. in Biology in 2024, where her thesis research focused on assessing survivorship and growth of corals outplanted as a part of the large-scale collaborative Restoration Team Trials study. As a master's student, Gabby was a graduate teaching assistant for Harbor Branch Semester by the Sea students and she was awarded an Indian River Lagoon Graduate Research Fellowship to conduct a coral transplanting study, expanding coral restoration on St. Lucie Reef. She is continuing to monitor these transplants as part of a long-term monitoring study as well as contributing to expanding the lab's population genetic research to include two additional coral species, Colpophyllia natans and Pseudodiploria strigosa. Prior to joining the lab, she graduated from the University of Rhode Island in May 2020 with a B.S. in Marine Biology. In 2019 she was a RI C-AIM Summer Undergraduate Research Fellow working with Dr. Carol Thornber and Dr. Lindsay Green-Gavrielidis to study benthic community ecology of kelps and rockweeds throughout Narragansett Bay, RI. In 2018, she studied abroad for a semester at the Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences (BIOS), where she began research diving and conducting coral reef research
|
Postdoctoral Researcher
Ryan Eckert
|
Ryan is a postdoc who completed his PhD in the lab in 2025 and his Master's in the lab in July 2019. Ryan’s thesis research focused on the coral species Montastraea cavernosa at several sites within two marine reserves on the Belize Barrier Reef. He used microsatellite markers and next-generation sequencing to examine how M. cavernosa populations and their assemblages of endosymbiotic algae (family Symbiodiniaceae) varied across a gradient from shallow to mesophotic depths. His doctoral research expanded the scale and scope of investigations into reef connectivity, including multiple coral and sponge species in Florida and the NW Gulf of Mexico. Ryan has been named a FAU Presidential Fellow, Outstanding Graduate Student Researcher of the Year for FAU Northern Campuses, and received PADI grant funding to support his research. He earned a B.S. in Biological Sciences from Florida State University and worked as a researcher at NOAA’s Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary prior to joining the Voss Lab. While at FGBNMS he coordinated offshore field logistics for scientific diving missions and Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) expeditions. He also ran quarterly long-term monitoring water quality sampling cruises and maintained long-term water quality sampling instrumentation.
|
Graduate Students
|
Allie is a Ph.D. candidate who joined the lab in 2020 and completed her Master’s thesis in 2022 focusing on the coral species Orbicella faveolata and its variable susceptibility to stony coral tissue loss disease (SCTLD). She used 2bRAD genotyping to investigate potential genetic links to intraspecific disease susceptibility and analyzed microbial communities to assess whether shifts in the coral microbiome were associated with variation in SCTLD response. Her doctoral research pivots to another critical reef stressor, thermal tolerance. In partnership with the University of Hawaiʻi’s Hawaiʻi Institute of Marine Biology (HIMB), she collaborates with the ToBo Lab and the Coral Resilience Lab to identify thermally resilient coral genotypes best suited for large-scale outplanting and restoration. She is using gene expression profiling, ITS2 symbiont markers, and 3D photogrammetry to identify resilient genotypes that not only withstand thermal stress but also exhibit robust growth and structural contributions to reef frameworks. Allie is also an active member of the lab’s mesophotic technical diving team, having received the Women Divers Hall of Fame Technical Dive Training Grant to advance her certifications and support deep reef research. Prior to joining the Voss Lab, she earned a B.S. in Marine Biology and a B.A. in Environmental Chemistry with a minor in Sustainability from Roger Williams University. As an undergraduate, she was a student in Dr. Koty Sharp’s Lab and a two-time INBRE-SURF fellow (2018, 2019). Her senior thesis research explored the microbiome dynamics of the temperate coral Astrangia poculata.
|
Milena Nesic
|
Milena joined the Voss Lab in June 2023 as a Coral Research Technician prior to beginning her Marine Science & Oceanography Master’s program in the Fall. She obtained her B.S. in Biology from the University of South Florida in 2022. During her undergrad, Milena’s honors thesis explored whether the presence of local wildlife influenced potential differences among soil bacterial communities. Following her graduation from USF, she embarked on a Dual Program internship at Mote's Elizabeth Moore International Center for Coral Reef Research and Restoration, during which time she participated in both Coral Restoration and the Coral Health & Disease programs. Under the tutelage of her mentors, one of whom included the OG Voss Lab alumna Dr. Courtney Klepac, Milena gained experience in coral reproduction and husbandry as well as foundational molecular biology techniques involved in coral DNA extraction. Her thesis research continues part of the Restoration Team Trials study, implementing ITS2 genotyping to assess shifts in coral-algal symbiont community assemblages across time and experimental restoration sites among three outplanted coral species. Moreover, Milena analyzed whether these symbiont assemblages were influenced by thermal stress and bleaching in 2023. She plans to defend her thesis this November 2025.
|
Erin Tharp
|
Erin joined the Voss Lab as a Ph.D. student in the Integrative Biology program in August 2024. Her Ph.D. research focuses on the ecological, physiological, molecular, and social dimensions of mesophotic coral ecosystems at the Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary and investigating how they differ from shallow reefs in biodiversity and function. Her work aims to provide critical baselines for adaptive, stakeholder-informed management under environmental change. She earned her M.S. in Conservation and Restoration Science at UC Irvine, where she collaborated with NOAA to improve outplanting strategies for White Abalone restoration in Southern California using Underwater Information Systems. She also contributed to reef disease research in Joleah Lamb’s HOPE Lab. Erin holds a B.S. in Environmental Studies with a minor in Marine Science from the University of Southern California, where she became a certified scientific diver. As a 2021 NSF REU student at the USC Wrigley Marine Science Center, she researched the population dynamics, habitat preferences, and seasonality of sea cucumbers off Catalina Island
|
Olivia Faris
|
Olivia joined the Voss Lab as a Master’s student in the Biology program in August 2024. She obtained her B.S. in Biology with minors in Environmental Science and Anthropology from Wake Forest University in 2024. Her thesis project focuses on determining the thermal thresholds of Montastraea cavernosa, the Great Star Coral, in Florida. She is also studying the interactive effects of thermal stress and stony coral tissue loss disease (SCTLD) on this species. Olivia received the FAU Biology Graduate Dean’s Fellowship Award and was awarded 1st Place in the Preliminary Round of FAU’s 3 Minute Thesis Competition. During her undergraduate studies, Olivia worked in the Berry Lab, investigating the impacts of multi-year drought on longleaf pine trees in North Carolina. In the summer of 2023, Olivia participated in the NSF Research Experience for Undergraduates program at Shannon Point Marine Center, where she was certified as an AAUS diver and studied ecosystem recovery in the San Juan Islands a decade after a significant Sea Star wasting Disease outbreak. Additionally, she studied abroad at the University of New South Wales in Australia, taking graduate-level courses in marine science. Olivia is eager to continue researching the effects of climate change on coral reef health.
|
Zoe Willis
|
Zoe joined the Voss Lab as a Marine Science & Oceanography master’s student in August 2025. She received a B.S. in Marine Biology and a B.A. in Chemistry from the College of Charleston in 2025. Throughout her time at C of C, Zoe conducted research on how ocean acidification impacts crab calcification and completed a thesis investigating the factors that influence mud crab pinching with Dr. Robert Podolsky. She has also studied abroad in the Virgin Islands and worked as a volunteer scientific diver at a reef restoration program in Indonesia. In the summer of 2024, Zoe worked with the University of Puerto Rico Mayagüez and the Puerto Rico DNER to understand connections between water quality and SCTLD treatment needs as part of her NOAA Hollings Scholarship research. Zoe is excited to continue pursuing her passion for reef restoration through her Master’s project.
|
Thomas Quello
|
Thomas joined the lab as a master's student in the biology program in August 2025. Before joining the lab, he received his bachelor’s degree in biology from St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota. As an undergraduate researcher, Thomas created plasmid vectors to investigate the role of lipid droplet proteins in Tetrahymena thermophila. During the fall semester of his senior year, Thomas studied abroad at the University of Otago in New Zealand. After graduation, Thomas worked as an aquatic restoration team leader, removing invasive aquatic species from lakes around Minnesota using SCUBA, in partnership with the Minnesota DNR. Thomas also spent time in Raja Ampat, Indonesia, working on his divemaster certification and collecting data for the monitoring of the Raja Ampat MPA. Most recently, Thomas worked in the Florida Keys at the Pigeon Key Foundation as a Marine Science Educator. As a graduate student, Thomas is interested in researching human impacts on coral reefs and the effective implementation of marine protected areas/no-take zones.
|
