GCL Staff & Students

Dr. Christopher Bird

Director & Associate Professor

Ph.D., Botany, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa

Dr. Jason Selwyn

Associate Research Scientist

Ph.D., Marine Biology, Texas A&M University - Corpus Christi.

Ms. Sharon Magnuson

Senior Laboratory Manager

Mr. Pedro Gonzalez

Laboratory Coordinator

M.S., Biology, Texas A&M University - Kingsville

Ms. Laurel Weeks

Laboratory Technician

B.S., Biology, Texas A&M University - Corpus Christi

Kevin Labrador, M.S.

Graduate Research Assistant, 2023-present

Kevin is pursuing a Ph.D. in Marine Biology and interested in using environmental DNA metabarcoding to assess tropical fish diversity.

Coralynn Coapland

Undergraduate Research Fellow, 2024-present

Coralynn is majoring in Biology, an NSF LSAMP Fellow, and is reconstructing the evolutionary history of the endangered Rota Blue Damselfly (Ischnura luta).

Avery Richardson

Undergraduate Research Fellow, 2024-present

Avery is majoring in Biology, an NSF LSAMP fellow, and is designing probes and primers to enable sensitive and accurate quantification of the endangered Rota Blue Damselfly (Ischnura luta) in environmental samples (eDNA) through qPCR.

Joseph Garza

Undergraduate Research Fellow, 2023-present

Joseph is majoring in Biology, a McNair Scholar, and is exploring the feasibility of extracting DNA from coral skeletons taken from islands spanning the South Pacific Ocean.

Jason Selwyn, Ph.D.

Graduate Research Assistant, 2018-2022

Jason completed his Ph.D. on the dispersal and habitat choice of marine gobies. Notably, Jason made a substantial contribution on the Coastal Bend COVID19 TaskForce.

Alex Aromin, M.S.

Graduate Research Assistant, 2024

Alex is pursuing a Ph.D. in Marine Biology and researching global functional diversity using datasets from recent environmental DNA studies.

Laurel Weeks, B.S.

Undergraduate Lab Technician, 2022-2023

Laurel completed her B.S. in Biology.