In December, Dr. Katie traveled to NOAA’s Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center in Honolulu, Hawai‘i for specialized training with Dr. Camryn Allen in the Protected Species Division. This visit was an important step toward launching a new sea turtle endocrinology laboratory at LMC. Endocrinology, the study of hormones, is a valuable tool in conservation science, and the new lab will initially focus on measuring testosterone levels in immature sea turtles to determine sex. Dr. Katie will be collecting samples from free-ranging loggerhead and green turtles in Florida, as well as from juvenile and sub-adult turtles admitted to LMC’s rehabilitation hospital. Identifying the sex of turtles in both the wild and rehabilitation will help researchers better understand how climate change and human-related impacts may affect males and females differently, strengthening future conservation efforts.
This exciting project is made possible by a generous grant from the Foxwynd Foundation, which provided funding for essential laboratory equipment. While Dr. Katie has extensive experience working in and managing wildlife endocrinology labs, applying these techniques to sea turtle blood is new, making this hands-on training especially valuable. During the visit, Dr. Katie also had the chance to meet Josefa Muñoz in person, who many may remember from her interview in the May 2025 newsletter celebrating Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. She is just as warm, smart, and thoughtful as she came across in her interview, a reminder that the sea turtle conservation community may be small, but our impacts are global.