Fisheries and Marine Institute of Memorial University of Newfoundland

Caley Brennan is a Master's student enrolled in the Fisheries Science program under the supervision of Dr. Arnault Le Bris. She completed a Bachelor of Science degree in marine biology from Memorial University and an Advanced Diploma in Integrated Coastal and Ocean Management from the Marine Institute. She has previously worked with Fisheries and Oceans Canada’s aquatic invasive species group in St. John’s, Newfoundland and assisted research on striped bass otoliths for the Fort Folly First Nation of New Brunswick. As a natural resources technician for the Qalipu First Nation of Newfoundland, she completed research projects on green crab and invasive tunicates. Caley's current research is focused on green crab catch and growth rates in Newfoundland.

Jessica Randall is Masters student in the Fisheries Science and Technology program. Originally from Washington, she earned her Bachelor of Science in Aquatic and Fishery Sciences at the University of Washington. For three years, she worked with the Alaska Fisheries Science Center in Seattle, WA as a research fisheries biologist. In this role, she provided taxonomic identifications of eggs, larvae and juvenile fishes of the Northeast Pacific and studied community assemblage structure of larval fishes in the Chukchi Sea. She also worked as an Alaskan groundfish observer, interned with the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization, and worked as a research assistant at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute.

Jessica is co-supervised by Drs. Maxime Geoffroy (CFER) and Hannah Murphy (DFO). In collaboration with DFO and local harvesters, her thesis will investigate herring predation on larval fishes, particularly capelin, in Trinity Bay, Newfoundland.

Xiaozhuo Tang is a master of fishery science student at CFER with Dr. Fan Zhang. She is originally from China. She got her bachelor’s degree at Shanghai Ocean University. She is interested in fisheries recruitment process, and trying to figure out the mechanisms behind recruitment variability. Her thesis will be focused on redfish recruitment. 

Natalie Fuller is a Master’s student enrolled in the Fisheries Science (Stock Assessment) program under the supervision of Dr. Noel Cadigan (CFER) and Dr. Jin Gao (DFO). Originally from British Columbia, she completed her BSc in Marine biology at the University of Victoria. Her research works on improving the indices of abundance for Labrador Shelf redfish (Sebastes spp.) by using a spatiotemporal model. She also is looking at the effects of survey configuration on the indices.

Kerri Lynch is an MSc. student in the Fisheries Science program under the supervision of Dr. Matthew Robertson.  Kerri's interest in graduate research started with a deep passion to protect and integrate human activities within the natural function of the environment.  She grew up spending summers playing on the North shore of Lake Erie and in Georgian Bay and spent a summer working with the NGO group Georgian Bay Forever doing public outreach to inform the community about the harm of plastic in our waterways.  She also worked on partnered research projects that turned into local policy change in protecting the environment. Kerri completed her biology degree focusing on aquatic ecology at Queen's University and then decided to journey away from freshwater biology to study the marine ecosystem here at MI.

"I am excited to learn about the complexities of the Atlantic Ocean's complex ecosystem as I develop a model to estimate capelin abundance based on predator stomach contents.  I hope my research will aid in developing future policies surrounding the protection of this integral fish species.  When I'm not at school, you can find me out in nature, snowboarding, hiking, biking, climbing or lost in thought looking for whales".