Christine San Antonio is a student in the Hannigan research lab in the School for the Environment. San Antonio received her B.S. degree in Biology and minor in Chemistry from the University of Vermont, where she participated in four distinct research projects including an honors thesis. After spending three years serving as an environment Peace Corps volunteer in the coastal villages of Fiji, San Antonio developed research interests that relate to the effects of global climate change on marine ecosystems and coastal communities. Her specific focus is on how ocean acidification affects growth, development, and disease susceptibility in the eastern oyster, an organism that is crucial to the health and sustainability of coastal New England waters. She hopes to eventually expand this research to assess how acidification and other environmental stressors are impacting key organisms in different coastal ecosystems around the world. Through the stringent application of scientific study, San Antonio hopes to conduct research that could ultimately be used to aid coastal communities in sustainably managing their marine resources and ecosystems in the face of global climate change.