Sonora Meiling received her B.Sc. in Zoology at Oregon State University and M.Sc. in Marine and Environmental Science at the University of the Virgin Islands. She is currently the Marine Disease Specialist at the University of the Virgin Islands leading various coral disease monitoring projects and investigating techniques to build disease resistance and resilience. Sonora hopes to identify methods to successfully out plant species susceptible to stony coral tissue loss disease and begin restoring the populations devastated by the recent outbreak. 

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