• Monitor environmental factors and larval zebra mussel abundances in the Hudson River and contrast conditions in embayments and in the main river channel
• Conduct dye studies near embayments to determine their ability to retain zebra mussel larvae
• Use data from the Hudson River and our previous data from the Illinois and Hudson Rivers to determine whether side embayments can act as sources or sinks for zebra mussel larvae

• Establish laboratory procedures for the analysis of microplastics in sediment of natural waters, and obtain preliminary data for Lake Michigan

This project aims to demonstrate the potential to use well-quantified niche shifts from established ‘avatar invaders’ to develop plausible distributions for similar emerging invaders. The study uses the red swamp crayfish Procambarus clarkii as an ‘avatar invader’ and the yabby Cherax destructor, as a data-poor emerging invader.

The objective of this work is to characterize microbial metabolism across a gradient of impacted sites in southwest Lake Michigan, spanning NE Illinois to NW Indiana.

While microbes tend to alter their environments as ecosystem engineers, their existence is a function of their environment. Any organism has a range of conditions it can tolerate; aquatic microbes and their metabolisms are generally dependent on temperature, pH, light, and resource availability. Humans also tend to significantly alter our environment, and we have shown the ability to cause change much faster than microbes. Increase of the planet’s temperature through greenhouse gas emissions will increase water temperatures and further reduce ice cover over the coming decades. On a finer scale, industrial practices emit pollutants into the coastal air, soil, sediments, and waters. The effects of these actions, prevalent in southwest Lake Michigan,
are poorly understood.

• Identify the factors responsible for variable mortality and growth of Dreissena larvae in the Illinois River and Hudson River Estuary.
• Model the interaction of flow with growth and mortality to predict the spatial and temporal patterns of settlement across systems.
• Determine how larval dynamics contribute to spatial and temporal patterns of settlement in the field.