Agricultural and Life Sciences (IFAS)
Skelton Lab
Led by James Skelton · Plant Pathology
What we study
The Skelton Lab studies freshwater ecosystems using field experiments, molecular tools like eDNA, and data analysis to understand biodiversity and conservation. They focus on fish, invasive species, and ecological interactions.
What working here is like
- Wet lab
- Fieldwork
- Computational
- Wild animals
- Bacteria & microbes
- Coding helps
- Papers
- 5
Recent papers, explained
- Environmental DNA Metabarcoding Read Numbers Reveal Consistent Patterns of Microhabitat Use Among Fish Species Within Multiple Lakes and Tidal Creeks
2026 · Environmental DNA
Uses DNA from water to track fish in different lake areas.
- The impact of non-native ambrosia beetles on fungal community assembly in hardwood (angiosperm) trees: an experimental quantification using multi-marker metabarcoding
2026 · Fungal ecology
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- Community structure and functional diversity of aquatic fungi are correlated with water quality: Insights from multi‐marker analysis of environmental DNA in a coastal watershed
2024 · Environmental DNA
Links water quality to the types and functions of fungi in water.
- Dammed coastal waterways are less diverse, more homogenous, and dominated by non-native species: Comprehensive insights from quantitative analysis of environmental DNA
2024 · The Science of The Total Environment
Finds dams reduce fish diversity and make communities more similar.
- Environmental DNA metabarcoding read numbers and their variability predict species abundance, but weakly in non‐dominant species
2022 · Environmental DNA
Tests how DNA from water can show which fish are most common.
Plain-language summaries are AI-written and reviewed by us; check the paper for details.
How to reach out
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