Dr Gareth Williams
Reader / Director of Impact and Engagement
Affiliations
Links
- https://www.bangor.ac.uk/oceansciences/staff/gareth-williams
Department Home Page - https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=EfvZsI8AAAAJ&hl=en
Google Scholar Page
Contact info
Room: 303 Craig Mair Phone: +44(0)1248 382588
E-mail: g.j.williams@bangor.ac.uk Twitter
I graduated in Marine Biology (University of Liverpool) in 2004 and completed an MSc in Marine Environmental Protection (Bangor University) in 2006. I began a PhD in Marine Biology (Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand) in 2007 in coral disease ecology, combining macroecology, experimental ecology, and histopathology to identify disease baselines and drivers of disease prevalence on Pacific coral reefs. A focus study site of mine was Palmyra Atoll, an uninhabited atoll in the Northern Line Islands. After obtaining my PhD in 2011, I was awarded a post-doctoral scholarship at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California San Diego (UCSD) where I continued to work on the macroecology of Pacific coral reefs. This role at Scripps transitioned into an Assistant Project Scientist position within the Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation in 2013. I left Scripps in late 2015 to return to the UK and take up my full-time role within the School of Ocean Sciences at Bangor University.
I am a marine ecologist specialising in coral reef ecology. My work focuses on the interaction of organisms with their environment, often taking a macroecological approach. I am particularly interested in how human activities and natural biophysical gradients interact to drive community patterns across multiple trophic levels (microbes to sharks) and scales (individual reefs to entire ocean basins). Much of my work incorporates remote coral reefs free from direct human impact, providing key replication at the unimpacted end of an intact-to-degraded ecosystem spectrum. By surveying across extensive geographical areas we address broad questions pertaining to: 1. the human, climatic and oceanographic drivers of coral reef ecosystem structure and function, 2. climate change impacts to coral reef ecosystems, 3. the spatial ecology of coral reefs, and 4. disease dynamics on coral reefs.
Research Areas
- 2021
- Published
Spatial and temporal scales of coral reef fish ecological research and management: a systematic map protocol
Lawrence, A., Heenan, A., Levine, A., Haddaway, N., Powell, F., Wedding, L., Roche, R., Lawrence, P., Szostek, C., Ford, H., Southworth, L., Sannassy Pilly, J., Richardson, L. & Williams, G. J., 25 Jan 2021, In: Environmental Evidence. 10, 3.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
- 2020
- Published
Local human impacts disrupt relationships between benthic reef assemblages and environmental predictors
Ford, A., Jouffray, J-B., Norstrom, A. V., Moore, B., Nugues, M., Williams, G. J., Bejarano, S., Magron, F., Wild, C. & Ferse, S., 21 Oct 2020, In: Frontiers in Marine Science. 7, 571115.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
- Published
A review of a decade of lessons from one of the world’s largest MPAs: conservation gains and key challenges
Hays, G. C., Koldewey, H., Meeuwig, J. J., Attrill, M. J., Barley, S., Bayley, D., . Benkwitt, C. E., Block, B., Schallert, R. J., Carlisle, A. B., Carr, P., Chapple, T. K., Collins, C., Diaz, C., Dunn, N., Dunbar, R. B., Eager, D. S., Engel, J., Embling, C. B., Esteban, N., Ferretti, F., Foster, N. L., Freeman, R., Gollock, M., Graham, N. A. J., Harris, J. L., Head, C. E. I., Hosegood, P., Howell, K. L., Hussey, N. E., Jacoby, D. M. P., Jones, R., Lange, I. D., Letessier, T. B., Levey, E., Lindhart, M., McDevitt-Irwin, J. M., Meekan, M. G., Micheli, F., Mogg, A., Mortimer, J. A., Mucciarone, D., Nicoll, M. A., Nuno, A., Perry, C. T., Sannassy Pilly, J., Preston, S. G., Rattray, A. J., Robinson, E., Roche, R., Schiele, M., Sheehan, E. V., Sheppard, A., Sheppard, C., Smith, A. L., Soule, B., Spalding, M., Stevens, G. M. W., Steyaert, M., Stiffel, S., Taylor, B., Tickler, D. M., Trevail, A. M., Trueba, P., Turner, J., Votier, S., Wilson, B., Williams, G., Williamson, B. J., Williamson, M. J., Wood, H. & Curnick, D. J., 14 Oct 2020, In: Marine Biology. 167, 11, 159.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
- Published
Modelling the linkage between coral assemblage structure and pattern of environmental forcing
Sandin, S. A., Eynaud, Y., Williams, G. J., Edwards, C. & McNamara, D., 14 Oct 2020, In: Royal Society Open Science. 7, 10, 200565.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
- Published
Possible control of acute outbreaks of a marine fungal pathogen by nominally herbivorous tropical reef fish
Neal, B., Honisch, B., Warrender, T., Williams, G. J., Work, T. & Price, N., 12 Jul 2020, In: Oecologia. 193, 3, p. 603-617Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
- Published
Localized outbreaks of coral disease on Arabian reefs are linked to extreme temperatures and environmental stressors
Aeby, G., Howells, E., Work, T., Abrego, D., Williams, G. J., Wedding, L., Caldwell, J., Moritsch, M. & Burt, J., Jun 2020, In: Coral Reefs. 39, 3, p. 829-846 18 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
- Published
Natural variation in coral reef trophic structure across environmental gradients
Heenan, A., Williams, G. & Williams, I., Mar 2020, In: Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment. 18, 2, p. 69-75Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
- Published
Three-dimensional digital mapping of ecosystems: a new era in spatial ecology
D'Urban Jackson, T., Williams, G. J., Walker-Springett, G. & Davies, A., 12 Feb 2020, In: Proceedings of the Royal Society B.. 287, 1920, 20192383.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
- 2019
- Published
Prey-size plastics are invading larval fish nurseries
Gove, J. M., Whitney, J., McManus, M. A., Lecky, J., Carvalho, F., Lynch, J., Li, J., Neubauer, P., Smith, K., Phipps, J., Kobayashi, D., Balagso, K., Contreras, E., Manuel, M., Merrifield, M., Polovina, J., Asner, G., Maynard, J. A. & Williams, G. J., 26 Nov 2019, In: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA. 116, 48, p. 24143-24149 7 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
- Published
Pathogenesis of a tissue loss disease affecting multiple species of corals along the Florida Reef Tract
Aeby, G. S., Ushijima, B., Campbell, J., Jones, S., Williams, G. J., Meyer, J., Hase, C. & Paul, V., 1 Nov 2019, In: Frontiers in Marine Science. 6, 678.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review