Scripps Student Spotlight: Malia Moore

Malia Moore is a sixth-year PhD candidate studying marine biology at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego. Moore grew up in Tucson, Ariz. and San Diego. She received her undergraduate degree in chemical biology at UC Berkeley. At Scripps Oceanography, Moore is researching marine conservation genomics, specifically studying local seagrasses through genome sequencing and comparative genomics. She is co-advised by Scripps Professor Eric Allen and Scripps Adjunct Professor Todd Michael, who also conducts research at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies. Moore is the recipient of a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship.

explorations now (en): Why did you choose to attend Scripps?
Malia Moore (MM): The joint mentorship offered a chance to do a very interdisciplinary PhD project that was self-directed. I was interested in seagrass from fieldwork I participated in at UC Santa Cruz, and all of this started to come together after meeting my current advisors Todd Michael and Eric Allen.

en: What are you researching at Scripps?
MM: I’m studying the local eelgrass species Zostera marina and Zostera pacifica, and a hybrid of the two species (Z. marina x Z. pacifica) that formed as the result of a restoration project in Mission Bay. Eelgrass is a very important conservation species that provides many ecosystem services, such as providing essential fish habitat, cycling nutrients and sequestering carbon. I’ve been studying the genomes of these species and their hybrid to understand whether the hybrid is resilient to low light. This would make it a good candidate for use in restoration projects, bolstering the success of these replanting efforts.

en: What’s life like as a Scripps student? Describe a typical day.
MM: Every day is different! That’s what makes it fun. Some days are fieldwork days where I head out to Mission Bay to collect samples or survey the seagrass bed. Other days are lab days that are spent processing samples, extracting DNA or RNA and using sequencing instruments to read the genome or transcriptome of the sample. Others, especially right now while I’m getting ready to defend my dissertation, are spent writing or analyzing data. No matter what kind of day it is, I always try to get outside — often underwater. That’s a great thing about the flexible schedule of a PhD student researcher.

en: What’s the most exciting thing about your work (in the field or in the lab)?

MM: The most exciting thing is being in the field, revisiting the same study site over multiple seasons and watching it change and grow. One year, there was an octopus that we always saw in the grass. This past season, my dive buddy and I visited the bed every month to take growth measurements, and by returning on a regular basis I got to observe when the bed started to flower. This was so exciting because I didn’t know whether the hybrid eelgrass could produce flowers and viable seeds. The bed offers up a lot of these little discoveries — it’s ever-changing.

en: Are there any role models or mentors who have helped you along the way?

MM: There are many. Numerous members of the Michael Lab have supported my growth in project development and bioinformatics, notably Jake Minich with whom I co-authored a sample preservation and sequencing methods study early in my PhD, and Nolan Hartwick who walked me through learning Python (a programming language) with so much patience. I’ve had some great role models in my mentors Todd and Eric, as well as Professor Steve Briggs who’s a member of my committee, and Professor Brad Moore, who offers a lifelong source of inspiration as my dad. Prior to Scripps, I had some amazing mentors like Katheryn Beheshti who introduced me to seagrass ecology, and Dana Foss who taught me my laboratory foundations and demonstrated how to balance work and life and family, especially as a woman in science.

en: What are some of the challenges you face as a student?

MM: I’ve been getting chronic migraines ever since falling ill with suspected COVID-19 in early 2020, right after visiting Scripps as a prospective student! Long COVID takes a lot of forms, and for me it has forced me to slow down, which is a challenge when there’s lots to do, both professionally and socially! But it has also presented a learning opportunity on the wisdom of focusing on just the most important project objectives, tasks and extracurriculars and being really present. I don’t know what grad school would’ve looked like without migraines, but with them, I’ve become a very deliberate worker. A product of this deeper focus is my paper “Hybridization and low light adaptability in California eelgrass (Zostera spp.)” that was just accepted for publication in the scientific journal Nature Plants.

en: What are your plans post-Scripps?

MM: I plan to continue working at the confluence of marine science and conservation. In the short term, I aim to broaden my perspective on the opportunities in this space by working outside academia and traveling to pursue a writing project. Something tells me that my path will always lead back to seagrass though! Seagrasses form amazing ecosystems and once you spend some time in them, you want to return.