Ashlee Hylton

Biography:

Ashlee is a Florida Native who has also lived in Texas and New Jersey before coming back to Florida for college. During graduate school, she managed water quality and nutrition in a coral spawning and larval ecology lab for two years. Ashlee’s thesis focused on optimizing the grow-out of coral microfragments in ex-situ and in-situ conditions. After graduating, she joined Mote working in the Aquarium on the Life Support Team, helping care for all of the mammals, reptiles, sharks, fish, and invertebrates. Now her love for corals has brought her to the Coral Gene Bank as a Staff Biologist, joining Mote’s dedicated researchers. Here, she works on projects aimed at preserving genetic diversity of Caribbean corals through gene banking and facilitating the creation of new genotypes of corals through assisted sexual reproduction.