As a UC Davis Dive Master and California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) scientific diver, Athena monitors the health of invertebrate fisheries in California. Her career aspiration is to be an environmental fisheries scientist in a management role. In pursuit of that goal, Athena is a master’s candidate at Sonoma State University (SSU), pursuing a degree in fisheries biology. Her research focuses on how understudied shellfish parasites influence shellfish disease and abundance. Using a multi-disciplinary approach with scientists from CDFW and SSU, aqua-culturists, and fishermen, Athena plans to study baseline abundances and life history characteristics of the blood sucking gastropod, Evalea tenuisculpita, and will investigate the combined role of parasitism, disease, overfishing, and climate change on shellfish decline in California.

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