Current undergraduate students (AY2024-25)
FYP: Andra Chia Jia Xuan
Main supervisor: Dr. Maxine Mowe
Co-supervisor: A/P Karina Gin
Andra's FYP project aims to further examine biovolume as well as community structure to determine dominant phytoplankton taxa around Singapore’s coast, accounting for how coastal environmental parameters affect phytoplankton biovolume. This project will also measure light availability, building on research conducted in previous projects that did not measure the effect of light levels on chlorophyll-a due to equipment constraints. Data collected will also contribute to the continual monitoring of changes in Chl-a levels around Singapore’s coast during the El Niño-Southern Oscillation. The project will also
experimentally investigate the effect of ocean acidification on phytoplankton communities around Singapore’s coast.
FYP: Brenna Lim Yi En
Main supervisor: Dr. Maxine Mowe
Co-supervisor: A/P Darren C. J. Yeo
​Brenna's FYP project is based on the rate of uptake and retention of microplastics via herbivory on aquatic macrophytes by freshwater invertebrates.
UROPS: Anton Ngan Rui Feng
Main supervisor: Dr. Maxine Mowe
Phytoplankton play an important role in the marine ecosystem as they form the base of many marine food webs. In recent years, there have been several occurrences of algal blooms along the Johor Strait which led to fish kills.. Unlike the Johor Strait, the Singapore Strait lies at the crossroads of the Malacca Straits and South China Sea, as such it is influenced significantly by the neighboring water bodies, this makes it crucial to understand the phytoplankton communities at both Straits and how changes in environmental variables and pollutants can affect the phytoplankton communities present at these locations. This study aims to understand how phytoplankton biodiversity and biovolume at each of the respective sites change throughout the year. The dominant taxa of phytoplankton at each site will be identified down to the genus level.
Graduate Students
MSc research project (NUS)
Heng Su Ping
Main supervisor: Dr. Maxine Mowe
Co-supervisor: Dr. Sandric Leong (TMSI)
Su Ping is a MSc by coursework student (Biodiversity Conservation and Sustainability) She is currently working on investigating physico-chemical oceanography and coastal phytoplankton communities in the Singapore and Johor Straits.
MSc Research student (University of Santo Tomas, Philippines)
Dimple May Gianne Dumaguit
Main supervisor: Prof. Rey Donne Papa (UST)
Co-supervisor: Dr. Maxine Mowe
DImple is an MSc research student based in University of Santo Tomas in Manila, Philippines. Her project is based on environmental drivers of phytoplankton functional group succession in Lake Yambo. This study will investigate how various physicochemical parameters (e.g., temperature, dissolved oxygen, pH) and nutrient levels (e.g., nitrate, total phosphorus, ammonia) affect these groups in Lake Yambo, Philippines.
