Melissa Pierce

Melissa Pierce, PhD, has a robust background in marine biology and data science. They served as a Data Scientist at Arkius from 2020 to 2022, followed by a role as Senior Data Scientist at the Discovery Partners Institute, where they contributed to wastewater-based epidemiology. Presently, Melissa is the Technical Program Director at Current, a nonprofit water innovation hub serving the Great Lakes region. They previously worked as a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the University of Illinois Chicago, focusing on sablefish aquaculture, and as a Research Assistant at the University of Connecticut, engaging in NSF-funded research on bivalve shellfish and microbial communities. They earned a PhD in Biological Oceanography from the University of Connecticut and a Bachelor of Science in Marine Biology from Roger Williams University.