October 18, 2025 – Salinity! Don’t Take it with a Grain of Salt!
Emma Garrison PhD student and Alison Whitney M.sc student, Marine Animal Disease Laboratory Team, Stony Brook University.
Salt is delicious on French fries and essential in the ocean. Salinity, how salty the water is, plays a big role in the lives of marine critters, especially our beloved bivalves! It affects how they feed, move, grow, and survive. Understanding salinity helps us predict how these animals respond to stress, climate change, and shifting habitats. Dive into the salty science behind one of the ocean’s most important variables and discover why even small changes can have a big impact.
Leran more about the MADL
Where did you go to school?
Alison and Emma are both graduate students in the Marine Animal Disease Lab at SUNY Stony Brook University.
What is your area of research?
Emma and Alison study how bivalves respond to environmental stressors—like salinity, temperature, low oxygen, and even toxic conditions—to better understand what makes some individuals more resilient than others. Their work supports sustainable shellfish farming and reveals how these animals may adapt to a rapidly changing ocean.
Who or what inspired you to become involved in marine science?
Emma is a New York City native whose closest body of water growing up was a notoriously toxic canal. In that very canal she met the resilient critters that manage to thrive through extremely challenging conditions, sparking a lifelong curiosity. Determined to understand how anything could survive in such harsh conditions, Emma set out to learn everything she could about the water and the organisms living in it.
Alison grew up tidepooling and was deeply connected to the sea stars in her coastal community. Over time, there was a troubling decline in their numbers due to disease. This loss drove her to focus on understanding marine diseases, with the goal of finding ways to protect marine organisms and the ecosystems they depend on.
What qualities do you think are important in order to become a scientist?
We think that the most important thing you need to become a scientist is curiosity about how the world works and stubbornness!
Why is your research topic important?
The MADL lab focuses on shellfish health and disease to support both aquaculture and wild shellfish populations. These populations are crucial for maintaining healthy marine ecosystems, as they clean water, stabilize sediments, and provide habitat for other marine life.
What will you be bringing with you to the “meet with an Oceanographer” day?
We will be bringing fun activities including “Tasting the world’s oceans” and “Piece together a bivalve” to learn about salinity and shellfish. We will also have an opportunity to watch bivalves filter water in real time to explore how different salinities change the behavior of these little animals.
What is the best advice you have for people interested in becoming involved in your field of research or in marine sciences?
If you’re interested in research, get involved in it! Don’t be intimidated! Never assume you can’t understand something. If something doesn’t make sense, always assume the explanation could be better, not that you’re not capable. Be persistent and keep asking questions until it clicks.
What is your favorite ocean organism?
Alison really loves octopuses (although bivalves are a close second!).
Emma loves mummichogs and Atlantic ribbed mussels (two canal survivors!).