I grew up in California and received my B.S. in Biochemistry and Cell Biology from the University of California, San Diego. My first introduction to academic research was as an undergraduate in a Developmental Neurobiology lab at the Salk Institute. After college, I got a job at a biotech company involved in sequencing the first human genome. It wasn’t long ( 3 months) before I realized I preferred academic research and the freedom and creativity it allowed. So I left industry and returned to academia working as a Research Associate in an immunology lab at Stanford University. I discovered a love for research, but wanted to apply the skills and knowledge I acquired in the biomedical field to an environmentally-related one. After completing a Master’s at Stanford University, I went on to the PhD program at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. I came to Rutgers as a postdoctoral researcher in 2007 and was promoted to Assistant Research Professor 2012.

Oceanography (Co-Advised with Kay Bidle)

Austin is interested in biomineralization of phytoplankton, phytoplankton physiology, and how phytoplankton interact with their environment, other organisms, and each other. His dissertation work aims to characterize the light-dependent costs and benefits of calcification (i.e. production of calcium carbonate plates) in coccolithophores.

The role of diatom host-virus interactions in silicon cycling