Dr. Rita Franco-Santos is an OFI Visiting Fellow and marine ecologist whose current research focuses on carbon pathways in kelp forests, more specifically on the fate and magnitude of kelp-derived carbon, and the potential for these ecosystems to contribute to carbon sequestration. On Thursday, Oct. 16, 2025, she will be presenting a seminar on Golden Carbon: Can Kelp forests Contribute to Climate Mitigation? This is a collaborative project with Dr. Sue Budge, which aims to determine if it is possible to verify the presence of kelp C in marine sediments if there are biomarkers (e.g., fatty acids) that can be unambiguously attributed to seaweed groups/species. This seminar will include a deep-dive into Franco-Santos’s research, its relevance for policy and conservation, and showcase preliminary results.
Rita Franco-Santos is a marine ecologist whose current research focuses on carbon pathways in kelp forests, more specifically on the fate and magnitude of kelp-derived carbon, and the potential for these ecosystems to contribute to carbon sequestration. While her expertise lies mostly in zooplankton (feeding) ecology, having worked with cephalopods, copepods, polychaete/urchin larvae, and krill in tropical, temperate, and polar regions, she applies her knowledge of isotopes and lipids as tracers for marine processes to any fields of interest. Rita is also highly involved in service roles, notably as co-coordinator of the Australian/New Zealand National Node of the UN Ocean Decade Early Career Ocean Professionals (ECOP) Programme and as a Member-at-Large in the Board of Directors of the Association for the Sciences of Limnology and Oceanography (ASLO).
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