About Shailja

Shailja Gangrade (pronounced “SHELL-ja Gung-RAH-day”) is a biological oceanographer, marine plankton ecologist, and educator. She is currently a postdoctoral research associate in the Department of Earth, Environmental & Planetary Sciences, and affiliate within the Institute at Brown for Environment & Society, at Brown University. She received her PhD in Oceanongraphy from Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO) at UC San Diego in 2024. At SIO, Shailja was awarded an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship and was advised by Prof. Peter Franks. She conducted much of her research within the California Current Ecosystem Long-Term Ecological Research program, and her dissertation investigated plankton patchiness at mesoscale fronts and filaments, with a focus on drivers, dynamics, and implications in the California Current System.

Shailja’s current research continues to focus on the physical and biological controls on plankton ecosytems across ocean margins (from coastal to offshore regions). Her work incorporates fieldwork on research vessels to collect physical and biogeochemical observations, as well as analysis of in situ and remote sensing measurements. Shailja’s current postdoctoral work, through the NASA S-MODE program, explores the composition of microbial communities within submesoscale eddies and the influence of extreme terrestrial precipitation on open-ocean microbial ecosystems.

Shailja’s teaching is centered around marine ecosystem dynamics, but her interdiscplinary academic background stimulates her excitement to teach courses throughout the earth, environmental, and ocean sciences. In her teaching, Shailja prioritizes a student-centered environment that incorporates place-based learning, and she aims to foster a genuine sense of wonder and joy, coupled with a scientific dynamical mindset, in students.