Institute at Brown for Environment and Society

Sinead Crotty '14 is a Biology concentrator, with a focus in Ecology & Evolutionary Biology. Together with fellow undergraduate Matthew Bevil, Professor Mark Bertness (Ecology & Evolutionary Biology) and Dr. Kenny Raposa (Narragansett Bay Estuarine Research Reserve), Sinead will investigate how patterns of salt marsh die-off relate to shoreline development, recreational fishing, and other human and environmental factors. Creek bank die-off has been documented in Cape Cod marshes, but only recently arrived in Rhode Island. Through this project, they hope to inform future coastal conservation and management. This will be Sinead’s first field research opportunity in Ecology, and builds on earlier GIS work she has done, also with Prof. Bertness, on the invasion of Phragmites australis into Narragansett Bay marshes. She is a Meiklejohn Peer Advisor and a Biology undergraduate teaching assistant.