Congratulations to NC State PhD student, Alex Rocco, who has successfully defended his PhD research titled, \u201cInnovative Modeling Approaches for Assessing and Predicting Life History and Spatiotemporal Dynamics of North Carolina’s Blue Crab Stock under Emerging Threats\u201d. Rocco conducted his research through the Department of Applied Ecology under Dr. Jie Cao.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Before pursuing his doctoral degree, Rocco graduated with a B.S. in Wildlife and Fisheries Science from Tennessee Tech University, and with an M.S. in Biology from Jacksonville State University in 2020. His master\u2019s thesis involved the behavioral ecology of crayfish. He says this experience with ecological relationships at the individual level led him to pursue an individual-based model project advertised by the Cao lab at NC State\u2019s Center for Marine Sciences and Technology (CMAST).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rocco says, \u201cMy [doctoral] research used a mark-recapture survey to evaluate the North Carolina blue crab\u2019s life history; a species distribution model to estimate how the population\u2019s distribution changes depending on environmental factors; and an individual-based model to simulate how the population is affected by temperature shifts and estrogen pollution.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
According to Rocco, his study resulted in estimated North Carolina blue crab seasonal growth, survival, and carapace width-to-weight relationships. His work also, \u201cIdentified environmental factors contributing to high blue crab densities and determined that blue crabs are vulnerable to temperature shifts and estrogen pollution over time.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rocco indicates that this information can be used to assist in future North Carolina blue crab stock assessment management. He says, \u201cThe blue crab stock in North Carolina is tricky; despite being overfished and overfishing occurring, the fishery is the most valuable in the state and is important to the food culture of eastern North Carolina. Blue crabs are also an important food source for other animals. I think we\u2019re moving in the right direction in terms of management, but I expect that the stock will be slow to recover moving forward.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rocco plans to pursue a career as a fisheries scientist. When asked what the most rewarding aspect of his work has been so far, Rocco says, \u201cBeing able to work closely with other scientists, graduate students, and experts in their fields has been extremely rewarding. I couldn\u2019t have done this without the support of the CMAST community and the other universities and agencies in Morehead City.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Congratulations to NC State PhD student, Alex Rocco, who has successfully defended his PhD research titled, \u201cInnovative Modeling Approaches for Assessing and Predicting Life History and Spatiotemporal Dynamics of North Carolina’s Blue Crab Stock under Emerging Threats\u201d. Rocco conducted his research through the Department of Applied Ecology under Dr. Jie Cao. Before pursuing his doctoral…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6083,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ncst_custom_author":"","ncst_show_custom_author":false,"ncst_dynamicHeaderBlockName":"ncst\/default-post-header","ncst_dynamicHeaderData":"{\"showAuthor\":true,\"showDate\":true,\"showFeaturedVideo\":false}","ncst_content_audit_freq":"","ncst_content_audit_date":"","ncst_content_audit_display":false,"ncst_backToTopFlag":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6082","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"displayCategory":null,"acf":{"ncst_posts_meta_modified_date":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cmast.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6082","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cmast.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cmast.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cmast.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cmast.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6082"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cmast.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6082\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6084,"href":"https:\/\/cmast.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6082\/revisions\/6084"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cmast.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6083"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cmast.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6082"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cmast.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6082"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cmast.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6082"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}