Dr. Maria Vernet is a marine phytoplankton ecologist specializing in polar environments, both Antarctic and Arctic. Her interests span from taxonomy to primary production, dynamics of plankton communities, planktonic food webs and pelagic-benthic coupling. Her approach has been primarily experimental, based on laboratory and field studies, including inverse modeling of food webs. Over the past 25 years, her research has focused on ice-phytoplankton interactions, studying plankton response after Antarctic ice-shelf breakup and more recently the influence of glacier meltwater in Antarctic and Greenland fjords. The Vernet Lab collaborates with the Antarctic Peninsula tourist ship industry (IAATO) to sample phytoplankton along Peninsula fjords, successfully obtaining valuable scientific data while engaging non-scientists in research.

Scripps Profile