{"id":18532,"date":"2023-09-18T10:39:14","date_gmt":"2023-09-18T14:39:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ncseagrant.ncsu.edu\/coastwatch\/?page_id=18532"},"modified":"2025-09-11T12:12:17","modified_gmt":"2025-09-11T16:12:17","slug":"behind-the-researcher","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ncseagrant.ncsu.edu\/coastwatch\/behind-the-researcher\/","title":{"rendered":"Behind the Researcher: Matt Damiano, Warming Waters, and Sustaining Iconic Fish"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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\n \n FROM THE FALL 2023 ISSUE<\/span>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t<\/svg><\/span>\n <\/a>\n <\/div>\n \n\n <\/div>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have a rapidly changing landscape of both the ocean environment and the makeup of who is going out to catch fish.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When you give a child a National Geographic<\/em> video on sharks, you might just hook them on sea life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI wanted to be a marine biologist, basically from the moment I watched a National Geographic video featuring Dr. Eugenie Clark,\u201d says Matt Damiano, an alumnus of North Carolina State University\u2019s Department of Applied Ecology. \u201cShe was my hero growing up.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Damiano started scuba diving when he was just 13 years old, earning certification when he was 15. But what he saw while diving inspired him to look beyond sharks and instead to the species they eat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSharks are big charismatic creatures, so they\u2019re a good ambassador to the 35,000-plus known species of fish that exist,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While earning his Ph.D. at NC State, Damiano worked to address fishery sustainability and resource management in the face of warming oceans and changing needs of fisheries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

THE PATH TO BOGUE SOUND<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

While at Oregon State, Damiano developed an interest in studying fish population dynamics, and then he earned his master\u2019s at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science studying Eastern oysters. After working in fisheries management for two years, Damiano found his way to NC State\u2019s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI decided that management wasn\u2019t really for me,\u201d says Damiano. \u201cMy heart was in research, and that\u2019s what led me to NC State. In 2019, I connected with Jie Cao at the Center for Marine Sciences and Technology.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"image:<\/a>
Matt Damiano (here): \u201cWe have a rapidly changing landscape of both the ocean environment and the makeup of who is going out to catch fish.\u201d Credit: NC State News & CALS.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy focus is population dynamics research, which is a specific part of quantitative ecology,\u201d Damiano explains. \u201cIt\u2019s about understanding the vital rates associated with fish and shellfish populations for use in management.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His research at NC State focused on three different fish species, including black sea bass, Atlantic cobia, and mahi mahi, also known as dolphinfish. He received funding for his work through a Marine Fisheries Initiative Grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the National Marine Fisheries Service-Sea Grant Fellowship in Population and Ecosystem Dynamics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

FROM DOLPHINFISH TO RED SNAPPER<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The fish he studied not only play important roles in the ocean ecosystem as predators and prey, but they\u2019re also important in the hospitality and food industries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDown in Florida, dolphinfish are considered one of the most iconic fish that you can go catch,\u201d Damiano says. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of economic components that are relying on being able to fish dolphinfish.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, the species faces many challenges, including changing ocean temperatures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey like to hang out in the Gulf Stream because it has a relatively constant temperature between 70 and 80 degrees. That\u2019s the sweet spot for them. If it gets too hot, they\u2019ll move. If it gets too cold, they\u2019ll move.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What we\u2019re seeing right now is that water is getting a lot hotter off of places like Florida, and it\u2019s getting a lot warmer toward the north.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Damiano says fishermen in Florida are seeing fewer dolphinfish, and fishermen in the Outer Banks are seeing more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dolphinfish are available to fish at different times of the year throughout their range, which extends from northeastern United States waters southward to the Caribbean Sea. To help fisheries managers improve their ability to set sustainable catches, Damiano applied a spatial model to commercial data to estimate population numbers at different seasonal and regional scales.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe were able to model dolphinfish in a way that seems to make sense biologically and ecologically, and it matches up with local perceptions of how the fish is doing,\u201d Damiano says. \u201cWe\u2019re still working some bugs out of the model to try and get the best estimates we can, but I think it\u2019s going to be really important in future work for dolphinfish.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Damiano currently serves as a postdoctoral researcher in a collaboration with NOAA\u2019s Beaufort Lab and the University of Miami\u2019s Cooperative Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Sciences, focusing primarily on red snapper, a species that is subject to overfishing. His work involves integrating \u201cclose-kin mark-recapture\u201d methods with the red snapper population assessment, using genetic information \u2014 instead of traditional physical tagging methods \u2014 to make important estimates about the species.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have a rapidly changing landscape of both the ocean environment and the makeup of who is going out to catch fish,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019m trying to keep up with those changes so we\u2019re able to maintain fishing activity, which is an important component of not just our economy but our identity as a species. It\u2019s an integral component of the way we feed ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n