About

Amy Maas is an Associate Professor at the Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences - Arizona State University in the School of Ocean Futures, with a joint appointment in the School of Life Sciences. She is a comparative ecophysiologist who uses experimental observations paired with distributional measurements to study the biogeochemical role of zooplankton and nekton in open ocean systems and the effects of climate change on these organisms. Her research focuses on understanding zooplankton roles in food webs and biogeochemical cycling, aiming to identify how changing environmental factors will affect these organisms and to incorporate this understanding into predictive models of marine ecosystem function. Maas received her PhD from the University of Rhode Island in 2011, where she explored the impacts of climate-related variables on pteropods living in extreme environments, working in Antarctica and the Eastern Pacific. She completed her postdoctoral work at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, studying regional and seasonal patterns of pteropod metabolic and transcriptomic sensitivity to ocean acidification. Since joining the Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences in 2015, she has leveraged access to the sea and time series data to provide ecological and biogeochemical context for her studies, leading to numerous projects on zooplankton, microbial communities, and carbon flux, including collaborations with NASA, NOAA, NSF, and ARPA-E. Her current research emphasizes the effects of environmental changes on marine invertebrates and their roles in biogeochemical processes, with the goal of improving understanding and modeling of marine ecosystem responses to climate change.

Research topics

• Environmental science
• Oceanography
• Geology
• Ecology
• Biology
• Geography
• Physics
• Geometry
• Mathematics
• Mechanics
• Classical mechanics

Selected publications

• The Outsized Role of Salps in Carbon Export in the Subarctic Northeast Pacific Ocean

  Global Biogeochemical Cycles · 2022 · 59 citations

  • Oceanography
  • Environmental science
  • Geology

  ) led to high salp pellet POC export from the euphotic zone-up to 48% of total sinking POC across the 100 m depth horizon. Salp active transport of carbon by diel vertical migration and carbon export from sinking salp carcasses was usually <10% of the total sinking POC flux. Salp-mediated export markedly increased BCP efficiency, increasing by 1.5-fold the proportion of net primary production exported as POC across the base of the euphotic zone and by 2.6-fold the proportion of this POC flux persisting 100 m below the euphotic zone. Salps have unique and important effects on ocean biogeochemistry and, especially in low flux settings, can dramatically increase BCP efficiency and thus carbon sequestration.

  DOI

• An operational overview of the EXport Processes in the Ocean from RemoTe Sensing (EXPORTS) Northeast Pacific field deployment

  Elementa Science of the Anthropocene · 2021 · 66 citations

  • Environmental science
  • Oceanography
  • Geography

  The goal of the EXport Processes in the Ocean from RemoTe Sensing (EXPORTS) field campaign is to develop a predictive understanding of the export, fate, and carbon cycle impacts of global ocean net primary production. To accomplish this goal, observations of export flux pathways, plankton community composition, food web processes, and optical, physical, and biogeochemical (BGC) properties are needed over a range of ecosystem states. Here we introduce the first EXPORTS field deployment to Ocean Station Papa in the Northeast Pacific Ocean during summer of 2018, providing context for other papers in this special collection. The experiment was conducted with two ships: a Process Ship, focused on ecological rates, BGC fluxes, temporal changes in food web, and BGC and optical properties, that followed an instrumented Lagrangian float; and a Survey Ship that sampled BGC and optical properties in spatial patterns around the Process Ship. An array of autonomous underwater assets provided measurements over a range of spatial and temporal scales, and partnering programs and remote sensing observations provided additional observational context. The oceanographic setting was typical of late-summer conditions at Ocean Station Papa: a shallow mixed layer, strong vertical and weak horizontal gradients in hydrographic properties, sluggish sub-inertial currents, elevated macronutrient concentrations and low phytoplankton abundances. Although nutrient concentrations were consistent with previous observations, mixed layer chlorophyll was lower than typically observed, resulting in a deeper euphotic zone. Analyses of surface layer temperature and salinity found three distinct surface water types, allowing for diagnosis of whether observed changes were spatial or temporal. The 2018 EXPORTS field deployment is among the most comprehensive biological pump studies ever conducted. A second deployment to the North Atlantic Ocean occurred in spring 2021, which will be followed by focused work on data synthesis and modeling using the entire EXPORTS data set.

  DOI

• Spatiotemporal Asymmetry in Metachronal Rowing at Intermediate Reynolds Numbers

  Integrative and Comparative Biology · 2021 · 20 citations

  • Mechanics
  • Physics
  • Mathematics

  In drag-based swimming, individual propulsors operating at low Reynolds numbers (where viscous forces dominate over inertial forces) must execute a spatially asymmetric stroke to produce net fluid displacement. Temporal asymmetry (that is, differing duration between the power vs. recovery stroke) does not affect the overall generated thrust in this time-reversible regime. Metachronal rowing, in which multiple appendages beat sequentially, is used by a wide variety of organisms from low to intermediate Reynolds numbers. At the upper end of this range, inertia becomes important, and increasing temporal asymmetry can be an effective way to increase thrust. However, the combined effects of spatial and temporal asymmetry are not fully understood in the context of metachronal rowing. To explore the role of spatiotemporal asymmetry in metachronal rowing, we combine laboratory experiments and reduced-order analytical modeling. We measure beat kinematics and generated flows in two species of lobate ctenophores across a range of body sizes, from 7 to 40 mm in length. We observe characteristically different flows in ctenophores of differing body size and Reynolds number, and a general decrease in spatial asymmetry and increase in temporal asymmetry with increasing Reynolds number. We also construct a one-dimensional mathematical model consisting of a row of oscillating flat plates whose flow-normal areas change with time, and use it to explore the propulsive forces generated across a range of Reynolds numbers and kinematic parameters. The model results show that while both types of asymmetry increase force production, they have different effects in different regions of the parameter space. These results may have strong biological implications, as temporal asymmetry can be actively controlled while spatial asymmetry is likely to be partially or entirely driven by passive fluid-structure interaction.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• The origin and diversification of pteropods precede past perturbations in the Earth’s carbon cycle

  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2020 · 42 citations

  • Oceanography
  • Environmental science
  • Ecology

  Pteropods are a group of planktonic gastropods that are widely regarded as biological indicators for assessing the impacts of ocean acidification. Their aragonitic shells are highly sensitive to acute changes in ocean chemistry. However, to gain insight into their potential to adapt to current climate change, we need to accurately reconstruct their evolutionary history and assess their responses to past changes in the Earth's carbon cycle. Here, we resolve the phylogeny and timing of pteropod evolution with a phylogenomic dataset (2,654 genes) incorporating new data for 21 pteropod species and revised fossil evidence. In agreement with traditional taxonomy, we recovered molecular support for a division between "sea butterflies" (Thecosomata; mucus-web feeders) and "sea angels" (Gymnosomata; active predators). Molecular dating demonstrated that these two lineages diverged in the early Cretaceous, and that all main pteropod clades, including shelled, partially-shelled, and unshelled groups, diverged in the mid- to late Cretaceous. Hence, these clades originated prior to and subsequently survived major global change events, including the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), the closest analog to modern-day ocean acidification and warming. Our findings indicate that planktonic aragonitic calcifiers have shown resilience to perturbations in the Earth's carbon cycle over evolutionary timescales.

  DOI

Recent grants

• Collaborative Research: Diel physiological rhythms in a tropical oceanic copepod

  NSF · $535k · 2018–2021

Frequent coauthors

• Ann M. Tarrant

  Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

  39 shared

• Leocadio Blanco‐Bercial

  Arizona State University

  31 shared

• Gareth L. Lawson

  Heritage Foundation

  31 shared

• Alexander J. Bergan

  Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

  17 shared

• Zhaohui Aleck Wang

  Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

  15 shared

• Deborah K. Steinberg

  William & Mary

  14 shared

• Ella L. Howes

  World Conservation Monitoring Centre

  11 shared

• Brad A. Seibel

  College of Marin

  11 shared

Education

• B.A.

  Hiram College

  2006

• Ph.D.

  University of Rhode Island

  2011

• Other

  Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

  2014

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• Carolyn Comptonh-118
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