NEWS

Although Jessica Glazner grew up in the Sierra Nevada mountains of Northern California, she was always drawn to the sea. From a young age, she loved nature and science, and by 10, she knew she wanted to be a marine biologist and has pursued it ever since. Glazner is a Pacific Islands Climate Adaptation Science Center (PI-CASC) Graduate Scholar working towards a PhD in marine biology at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa.

She came to Hawaiʻi after her undergraduate studies at the University of California at Santa Cruz and began working as a scuba instructor for several years before returning to school at the University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo for graduate school. “I am really grateful that I took the time off between undergrad and grad school,” said Glazner. “I had the opportunity to spend thousands of hours underwater, exploring Hawaiʻi’s reefs and building a deep connection to this place. During this time, I witnessed mass coral bleaching and the rapid loss of corals, which inspired me to work in coral reef research and conservation.”

Now, working with Dr. Megan Donahue at the Hawaiʻi Institute of Marine Biology and with The Nature Conservancy’s Palmyra Program, Glazner is researching how corals respond to different sources of nutrient enrichment during bleaching events. Human-derived nutrients, such as wastewater effluent, are entering coral reefs around populated islands and seem to decrease corals’ health and tolerance to heat stress. Comparatively, naturally-derived nutrients, such as seabird guano (excrement), that are entering coastal waters near remote islands appear to be beneficial to corals, increasing their overall health and resilience to heat stress. Her research project seeks to understand why these two nutrient sources have opposite effects on the corals.

“This is the first project to compare directly these two sources of enrichment in a controlled experiment,” says Dr. Megan Donahue, adding, “Compared to prior studies examining the effects of inorganic nutrients in isolation, wastewater effluent and guano are complex mixtures of inorganic nutrients and dissolved organic compounds – and this is how nutrients are delivered to corals in reef environments.”

“I conducted an experiment by dripping either wastewater effluent or seabird guano into tanks with corals to investigate how these two nutrient sources are affecting coral health and their resilience to bleaching,” said Glazner.

The guano is authentic, as she also had the opportunity to visit Palmyra Atoll, a remote atoll in the Central Pacific where The Nature Conservancy runs a small research station, to collect seabird guano to use in the experiment. “There are over one million nesting seabirds there and super vibrant healthy coral reefs. I have never seen such beautiful coral!” she said.

One desired outcome of the project is to help resource managers better protect coral reefs, both on populated islands with wastewater runoff and on remote islands with large seabird populations. As a result, Glazner has been collaborating with both government and non-profit agencies to solicit feedback, aligning her research question with management priorities.

“I recently had a conversation with one of the managers from a local seabird conservation non-profit because they are interested in our results to help them promote coastal habitat restoration to increase local seabird populations,” said Glazner. “Our results will hopefully help them achieve this by demonstrating the importance of guano to the coral-island ecosystem.”

With the project nearing its end, Glazner is currently working on a publication that is focused on the physiological responses of corals. In the future, she wants to work for a federal agency so she can continue studying ecosystem functioning and resilience to global climate change around the Pacific.

For now, Glazner is enjoying life in Hawaiʻi. When she is not working in the lab, Glazner spends time sharing her passion for corals with others. She and her partner own a small business called Liquid Cosmos Divers. “It is a small scuba diving operation specializing in education and conservation-focused dive tours,” she said. “I am really lucky to get to share my knowledge about Hawaiʻi’s coral reefs, as well as the research I am conducting, with our divers every week!”