PhD Graduate
Year Admitted
2013
Year Graduated
2021
Research Areas
marine aquaculture, marine spatial planning, climate variability, climate change, sustainable seafood
Faculty Advisor
Steve Gaines
Committee
Hunter Lenihan, Robert Miller
Dissertation Title & Abstract
Incorporating Climate Variability and Change into Marine Spatial Planning for Aquaculture in the Southern California Bight
Marine aquaculture has significant potential to produce sustainable seafood for the future. Spatial planning is crucial to identify ideal areas and to avoid conflict with other sectors. Climate change must be incorporated into the spatial planning process to ensure sustainability of this industry. This thesis focuses on understanding the impacts of climate variability and climate change on productivity and site selection for aquaculture in Southern California. First, the effects of internal variability of the region are analyzed using historic environmental data on mussels, striped bass and kelp aquaculture models. Empirical orthogonal functions and principal component analysis are used to identify spatial and temporal patterns of variability. Results show that decadal variability has a relevant influence over productivity and profitability of farms. Next, climate change projections up to year 2100 are incorporated in the analysis. Despite a decreasing trend in production, variability is more relevant in kelp and mussels given the dependence of nutrients of the environment. Fish benefit from warming temperatures, and the increasing thermal trend dominates over variability fluctuations. Spatial patterns of productivity remain similar despite adding climate change projections until optimal thresholds are reached. These results highlight the value of species and site selection in the planning process.
Fellowships
Conacyt/UC-Mexus Fellowship
Latin American Fishery Fellowship- LAFF (Walton Family Foundation)
Dr. Daniel Vapnek Scholarship for Sustainable Fisheries Research
Education
Master of Environmental Science and Management, UC Santa Barbara
BSc Biology, Universidad Autónoma de Sinaloa, México