Dr. Amy C. Hirons is a Professor of Oceanography at Nova Southeastern University (NSU), Dania Beach, Florida, USA. Hailing from the Hawaiian Islands and then pursuing graduate degrees at the University of Northern Colorado in Zoology (MS - 1989) and the University of Alaska Fairbanks in Oceanography (PhD - 2001), Amy’s research has focused on the use of biological organisms to study ocean production. Her research has taken her from the Arctic to the Antarctic, including waters around Alaska, Russia, Canada, southeast Asia, Hawaiian Islands, Oceana, and Peru. She and the members of her Charismatic Megafauna and Oceanography Laboratory (CMOL) focus their research largely on the study of energy transfer through the study of trophic dynamics, or food webs, as well as biomagnification of environmental contaminants. CMOL team member research at PSJ has included detection of El Niño – Southern Oscillation (ENSO) signals within pinniped tissues, contaminant concentrations and preferential offloading in pinnipeds, modeling contaminant sequestration in Humboldt penguins, historical reconstruction of seabird trophic dynamics and contaminant exposure, and coastal Peruvian food web reconstruction.