The Coral Health and Disease program is located at two locations. If interested, please apply for Coral Health and Disease Program in your internship application, but specify one or several of the following program locations or projects in your statement of interest.
Coral Health and Disease - Dr. Sara Williams
The Coral Health and Disease Program focuses on understanding the susceptibility and resilience of corals to major global threats such as climate change, ocean acidification and disease as well as local impacts. Specifically, coral disease is one of the greatest threats to reefs around the world and disease dynamics within our oceans are still poorly understood. This program is based at our City Island campus, located in Sarasota, Florida. Projects within this program will be laboratory and/or computer based and may include wetlab exposure experiments as well as molecular applications. Daily duties will include care and maintenance of wetlab space and participation in currently funded research projects. Laboratory assays may include DNA extractions, PCR, photophysiology, and morphometric analyses of coral health states. Prefer students familiar with command-driven computer programs such as R and have basic biological statistics skills. Computer based work for interns familiar with R includes skill development in microbiome analyses, data visualization, open-access code, and relevant biological statistics. Additionally, interns may be asked to participate in education/outreach activities within our program as needed. Opportunities to conduct field work will be minimal. Hours are Monday-Friday, 9am-5pm, with required occasional long hours and weekends.
Interested applicants should indicate “Coral Health and Disease – Sarasota” as their preferred program in their statement of interest.