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PhD Student Katie CramerUndergraduate Degree: B.S., Ecology, Behavior, Evolution Undergraduate University: University of California, San Diego email: kcramer@ucsd.edu Advisor: Jeremy Jackson Research Interests:I am a Marine Biology student studying the relationship between changes in coral community structure and patterns in forest conversion over the past few centuries within the Meso-American reef region. As my research interests include the study of terrestrial and marine tropical ecosystems, focusing on the coupling of rainforests and reefs is appropriate. My current work is being conducted in Caribbean Panama, where I am re-constructing the coral communities of reefs of the past using dead coral rubble, and comparing them with present
coral communities. This comparison will allow me to obtain baseline information on the "natural" state of reefs centuries ago, before large-scale forest conversion began in this region. I plan to expand the spatial scale and gradient of forest conversion considered in this study to include other regions of the Meso-American reef. Publications
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Another perk is that this work allows me to spend time in the most beautiful and biologically rich regions on the planet! 
My previous research at NOAA Fisheries focused on interactions between the yellowfin tuna purse-seine fishery and depleted dolphin populations in the Tropical Eastern Pacific. My work studied the relationship between declines in reproductive output of these dolphin populations and fishing effort.