A Summer of Opportunity

Coral reefs, like research communities, face disturbances, but their response to major change determines their perseverance. When most people think of coral reefs today, they picture coral bleaching and collapse, but there’s more to the story. New research from the lab of Stuart Sandin, a marine biologist at UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography, shows that the coral assemblages of reefs prior to disturbance events impact how these reefs respond. The community composition of a reef can potentially buffer or enhance how reefs respond to a disturbance like a cyclone or a marine thermal stress event. Certain coral taxa are better equipped when facing environmental pressures than others.Upon reflecting on the observations from this study, I can’t help but compare the reality of coral reefs to the reality of academic research today. This study showcases Scripps Oceanography researchers’ innovative, collaborative approach to understanding reef resilience amid global change.










Several participants from the 2020 JT-SURF Program meeting via Zoom.

My first introduction to Scripps was in the midst of global uncertainty. COVID-19 forced the cancellation of summer research internships across the United States in 2020. I, along with hundreds of other students nationwide, was unsure what the next steps were for my research progress. Thankfully, that summer, the community at Scripps was able to open its “virtual” doors and host undergraduate students as part of the Jane Teranes-Scripps Undergraduate Research Fellowship (JT-SURF) Program.The SURF Program is a summer Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) hosted at Scripps Oceanography and funded by the National Science Foundation. This prestigious fellowship is designed to engage with undergraduates in earth, ocean and atmospheric sciences to encourage and nourish research skills in promising scholars early in their college career. In 2024, the program was renamed after the late Jane Teranes, its longtime and beloved coordinator. In prior years, JT-SURF student participants would spend the summer at Scripps, working under different labs to conduct research projects. However, due to COVID-19 limitations, the program pivoted and virtually welcomed over twenty summer interns across the United States.From balancing time zone differences to remote learning alongside mentors, these students were able to gain various skills in coral reef ecology in a novel way. This virtual format ended up being surprisingly beneficial due to the partnerships and nature of work within the Sandin Lab, harnessing photogrammetry as a tool to further understand natural systems. Photogrammetry enables us to build detailed 3D models of coral reefs. With it, we can complement long-term monitoring techniques to achieve high-resolution comparisons across space and time. 










Collection of digital reefs surveyed by the Sandin Lab including Ant Atoll in the Federated States of Micronesia (top left), Upolu in Samoa (top right), and Rarotonga (bottom left and right).

Additionally, the Sandin Lab runs the 100 Island Challenge, a Scripps-led project that aims to document reefs across 100 islands. Unlike traditional laboratory methods, we were able to virtually dive and learn through the lab’s digital collection of reef habitats spanning various time series. This REU opened new pathways for many participants that year, with many students broadening their academic horizons into STEM graduate programs and professions. For me, this program was especially pivotal because it introduced me to the work that I would later pursue in graduate school. I wanted to continue coral reef research because of its direct relevance to my home in Guam, where healthy reefs are essential to our environment, culture and future. This connection deepened my commitment to my island, with the overall goal of becoming a professor and working alongside my community. Today, as we face new hurdles within the scientific community, we are reminded that we are still persevering through these pressures. Federal divestment from science is an ongoing concern. Without critical funding, the fate of long-term monitoring programs are at risk. Despite these difficulties, we turn to other avenues and broader collaborations to hold steadfast in the work we do. We continue to persist and progress with research, extracting as much ecological information as we can from the documentation we are able to capture. This year, the Sandin Lab welcomes another JT-SURF undergraduate intern. This time, the program will be in-person across multiple labs. The Sandin Lab will be sponsoring a new student who will work in collaboration with the Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation and the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance to help design and create a conservation digital twin for the park's biodiversity reserve. Again, I am reminded of the lessons we learned from the 2020 summer program. Like coral reefs, our community response to change is determined by our partnerships and our ability to adapt to external pressures. Another summer, another opportunity to collaborate and learn! Ahmi Cacapit is a PhD candidate in the Sandin Lab at UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Her research focuses on coral reef ecology, with an emphasis on how natural recruitment shapes population dynamics across reefs in the Pacific. You can follow her @tsunahmi_ on Instagram.