Kelsey Beavers, who is researching coral reef disease
Kelsey Beavers’ love for the ocean began at a young age. Born into a family of avid scuba divers, she became a certified junior diver at age 11.
“It was a different world,” Beavers said. “I loved everything about the ocean.”
After graduating from high school, Beavers, a native of Austin, moved to Fort Worth to study environmental science at Texas Christian University, where one of her professors knew Laura Midlers, a biology professor at the University of Texas at Arlington, who encouraged Beavers to continue her studies at Arlington.
“Kelsey came to UTA to study coral diseases for her PhD, but quickly became involved in a large project studying Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease (SCTLD), a rapidly spreading disease that is killing corals all along the Florida coast and in 22 Caribbean countries,” Midlers said. “She has been an incredible asset to our team and is lead author on a paper we published about the disease in Nature Communications last year.”
Laura Midler and Kelsey Beavers
As part of her doctoral studies, Beavers completed an original study studying gene expression in coral reefs affected by SCTLD. Her research involved scuba diving off the coast of the U.S. Virgin Islands to collect coral tissue samples, then returning to the lab to analyze the data.
“What we’ve found is that the symbiotic algae that live within the corals are also affected by SCTLD,” Beavers said. “Our current hypothesis is that as the algae move from reef to reef, they could be spreading the disease that has been devastating coral reefs since it first appeared in 2014.”
A big part of Beavers’ dissertation project involved crunching large amounts of gene expression data extracted from coral samples and analyzing it in terms of disease susceptibility and severity.
“Because the analysis portion of the project was much larger than using a regular Mac, I worked with the Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC), which is part of the University of Texas system at Austin, and used their supercomputer,” Beavers said.
Beavers really enjoyed the data analysis portion of the project, so when she saw a full-time position opening at TACC, she jumped at the chance. She is currently working there part-time until she graduates, when she plans to move to Austin for her new job.
“I am very excited about my new position because it will allow me to work on research projects other than my own,” she said. “It will be interesting to become an expert in data analysis and help other scientists solve complex problems using TACC’s supercomputers.”
As part of her work, she will be visiting other campuses in the University of Texas System to train researchers on how to use the tools available at TACC.
“I’m really proud of the work Kelsey has done in the lab over the past few years and I’m excited to see her succeed after she graduates,” Midlers said. “Seeing our students succeed is one of the best parts of the job.”