Degree

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Oceanography and Coastal Sciences

Document Type

Dissertation

Abstract

Emerging infectious diseases pose imminent risk to the marine realm and coral reefs in particular. Since its emergence in 2014, stony coral tissue loss disease (SCTLD) has dramatically reduced living coral cover in Florida and charted a similar course in the Caribbean. SCTLD is by far the most severe coral disease in history and has driven highly susceptible species to local extinction, yet the mechanisms driving the regional epizootic are not well understood. Here, we developed reef-scale parameterizations of disease spread using model sites in the lower Florida Keys, developed extensive metacommunity habitat maps for the US Caribbean, and then combined the two as inputs to a multi-scale epidemiological-biophysical model of SCTLD in the US, Spanish, and British Virgin Islands. Our goals included investigating the roles of host density, host identity, depth-structured habitat, and spatiotemporally explicit ocean currents in driving outbreaks. Findings identify the species compositions, habitat niches, and oceanographic features that render a marine metacommunities vulnerable to uniquely devastating multi-host contagion. Managers and policymakers who are tasked with allocating resources toward conservation may find our modeling useful in identifying spatially explicit risk factors, as the model framework can ideally be applied to future multi-species marine mass mortalities caused by emerging infectious diseases.

Date

1-8-2026

Committee Chair

Holstein, Daniel H.

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