Sandra Brooke

Senior Conservation Fellow

Dr. Sandra Brooke’s primary objective is to identify sensitive coral reefs and advocate for their protection from damaging human activities, especially bottom trawling, and to ensure adequate enforcement of regulations so that sensitive ecosystems are truly protected. After completing undergraduate and master’s degrees in England, Sandra spent a few years working in mosquito control in the Cayman Islands, where she learned to dive and discovered marine ecosystems. She then obtained an M.A in Marine Biology from Virginia Institute of Marine Science and a Ph.D (2002) from the University of Southampton UK, where her research examined reproductive ecology of a deep water coral Oculina varicosa. Sandra’s research efforts have focused on deep coral ecosystems in the Norwegian Fjords, Aleutian Islands, US South Atlantic Bight and Gulf of Mexico, and most recently the deepwater mid-Atlantic canyons. Since joining Marine Conservation Institute in 2008, she has worked to locate and win protection for deep-sea coral ecosystems in the southeastern US and conducted research on deep corals in the Gulf of Mexico for post-Deepwater Horizon oil spill damage assessment. She has also worked extensively on shallow coral reefs in the Caribbean and south Florida. She has courtesy research faculty position at the University of Oregon and serves on the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council’s Coral Advisory Panel and holds the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary Advisory Council Conservation Seat.