Heather Peterson

Biologist

B.S. University of California at Davis,
Environmental Resource Science and Management

M.A. San Francisco State University, Marine Biology

hapeters@usgs.gov

Research Interests
I came to USGS with a background in California water management, including water quality management, and water quality monitoring. With my recent Master’s work I was able to document the influence of environmental change on ecological processes in the estuary using long-term environmental and biological monitoring data.

Biological invasions, including the invasion of the Asian bivalve Potamocorbula amurensis, have had a large-scale influence upon ecological processes within the San Francisco Estuary, and so I have also been studying the ecology of invasions to try to understand the nature of invasions in estuarine systems, including the causes and effects of invasion in estuarine ecosystems.

My present focus at USGS is in estuarine benthic community dynamics, especially the ecology of benthic invertebrates. I use environmental and benthic community data from sampling efforts throughout the Estuary to assess patterns associated with ecosystem health or ecosystem stress (often due to pollution).

Selected publications:
Peterson, H. A. (2002) Long-term Benthic Community Change in a Highly Invaded Estuary. Masters Thesis, Marine Biology. San Francisco State University. San Francisco, CA, USA. 108 pp.

Curriculum Vitae
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