UF Center for Coastal Solutions

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UF Center for Coastal Solutions Delivering advanced coastal intelligence and decision aids for resilience.

Florida has seen the damage inland floods can cause, including the 2023 Fort Lauderdale and 2024 South Florida floods. U...
10/22/2026

Florida has seen the damage inland floods can cause, including the 2023 Fort Lauderdale and 2024 South Florida floods. Understanding why heavy rain leads to flooding is one step toward better forecasts.

Ebrahim Ahmadisharaf, Ph.D., of the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering, will join the Howard T. Odum Wetlands seminar via livestream on Oct. 28th to discuss how rainfall and soil moisture work together to shape flood events. He’ll also talk about what radar, satellite observations and other data can tell us and where uncertainty remains.

Watch the seminar live at 11:45 a.m. ET: https://www.youtube.com//streams

Pictured is Dr. Ahmadisharaf with members of his research team.

A scientist, educator and artist—and a member of our CCS community! CCS affiliate faculty member Elise Morrison, Ph.D., ...
10/20/2026

A scientist, educator and artist—and a member of our CCS community!
CCS affiliate faculty member Elise Morrison, Ph.D., studies how human activities affect the way carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus move through our environment. UF’s Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering shares a look at her journey from California’s salt marshes to UF, along with her love of painting, baking and inspiring future engineers. Get to know her below!

A trip into the salt marshes of Sapelo Island, Georgia, brought the research team of Alberto Canestrelli, Ph.D., a UF fa...
10/20/2026

A trip into the salt marshes of Sapelo Island, Georgia, brought the research team of Alberto Canestrelli, Ph.D., a UF faculty member affiliated with the UF Center for Coastal Solutions, closer to understanding how ribbed mussels may affect the buildup of sediment. With field technician Patrick Norby at the helm of a UF research boat, the team of graduate students headed to the field site to collect water and soil samples, download marsh sensor data, and measure water flow in a tidal creek.

The pictures from the field offer a glimpse of the work from deploying instruments in the creek to preparing a soil core for laboratory analysis. Joining Norby were Subal Vinayan, Nicolas Thrush, Jacopo Composta, and Felipe Martins, as seen in the group picture.

A shared interest in our coasts is bringing UF students together and taking them into the community! Doctoral students L...
10/19/2026

A shared interest in our coasts is bringing UF students together and taking them into the community! Doctoral students Lea Eggensberger and Noah Evans are leading the growing Center for Coastal Solutions Student Club, which has already attracted interest from more than 30 students across the university. Members have helped children explore coastal science through hands-on activities at Tower Road Branch Library and Howard Bishop Middle School. They also organize monthly CCS socials where students and faculty can get to know one another. Their hope is to build a community where students from different fields can share ideas, learn from each other and work together on coastal challenges.

Meet Lea and Noah and read the story behind the club at https://ccs.eng.ufl.edu/ccs-student-club-aims-to-build-an-interdisciplinary-community-in-coastal-sciences/

Seagrass beds, mangroves and salt marshes do important work along Florida’s coast. Learn about ways to make coastal ecos...
10/15/2026

Seagrass beds, mangroves and salt marshes do important work along Florida’s coast. Learn about ways to make coastal ecosystems more resilient with Andrew Altieri, Ph.D., associate professor and associate director of UF's Center for Coastal Solutions and the Department of Environmental Engineering Sciences, as he shares examples from his current research during a livestreamed seminar.

Seminar hosted by the UF Howard T. Odum Center for Coastal Solutions

When? Oct. 21, 2026
Time? 11:45 a.m. ET.
Where? Watch live on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com//streams

How can changes in the saltiness of an estuary affect nearby groundwater? That connection is at the heart of UF Ph.D. ca...
10/14/2026

How can changes in the saltiness of an estuary affect nearby groundwater?

That connection is at the heart of UF Ph.D. candidate Mohsen Yavary Nia’s dissertation, “From Estuarine Mixing to Groundwater Salinization: Modeling Salinity Dynamics Across Coastal Systems.”

Under the guidance of Alberto Canestrelli, Ph.D., Mohsen uses models to study how salinity changes in estuaries and how saltwater moves into adjacent coastal aquifers. His work helps researchers understand and predict these processes to support coastal water-resource management.

Join us for his dissertation defense!

📅 Monday, October 19, 2026
🕣 8:30 a.m. ET
📍 Weil Hall, Room 365C, University of Florida
💻 Attend via Zoom: https://ufl.zoom.us/j/3311571885

Attend in person or online to learn more and support Mohsen!

Think of it as an apartment building for oysters...that also has benefits for the shoreline. UF researchers are testing...
10/14/2026

Think of it as an apartment building for oysters...that also has benefits for the shoreline.

UF researchers are testing 3D-printed structures with openings, channels and textured surfaces where oyster larvae can settle and grow. The structures are designed to provide shoreline protection right away while giving oysters time to build a reef that supports marine life and helps absorb wave energy.

And the oysters are moving in! Early tests in Cedar Key show them settling and growing on the structures.

Through the UF-led AMERICA project, researchers are also listening to coastal communities to understand their priorities and help shape how the technology could be used.

Meet the people behind the project and see how engineering and nature could work together to protect Florida’s shores at https://ccs.eng.ufl.edu/building-living-reefs-for-stronger-coastlines/.

(The first two photos show marine life growing on the 3D-printed structures. The last photo features Savanna Barry, Ph.D., who leads the project’s community engagement and testing efforts.)

A beach can change dramatically during a single storm. Other changes unfold over decades or thousands of years. On Anast...
10/13/2026

A beach can change dramatically during a single storm. Other changes unfold over decades or thousands of years. On Anastasia Island, UF researchers are studying both to better understand this constantly shifting coastline.

Join Peter N. Adams, Ph.D., professor in UF’s Department of Geological Sciences, for a seminar exploring research from UF’s Dune Life Cycles team. Learn why some beaches and dunes struggled to recover after Hurricane Irma, how inlets and beach nourishment affect nearby shorelines, and what ancient beach ridges reveal about the island’s history. Understanding these changes can help inform coastal engineering decisions and nature-based solutions as coastal communities grow.

When? October 15, 2026
Time? 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. ET
Location: Join via YouTube Live at https://www.youtube.com//streams

The Canal Science Symposium drew a crowd on Marco Island! All 150 seats filled, so organizers set up an overflow locatio...
10/12/2026

The Canal Science Symposium drew a crowd on Marco Island! All 150 seats filled, so organizers set up an overflow location with a livestream.

Mauricio Arias of the University of South Florida and David Kaplan, Ph.D., associate director of the Center for Coastal Solutions and director of the Howard T. Odum Center for Wetlands, spoke about nature-based solutions. UF’s Holden Harris, Ph.D., was also part of the program.

Thanks to C-HAWQ for bringing researchers and the community together. The Coastal Breeze captured the day in a two-page spread featuring photos of the event and speakers.

Read more at https://www.coastalbreezenews.com/news/community/canal-science-symposium-addresses-water-quality-worries/article_b38841ff-349c-4fb0-9522-4cb6d982b972.html.

So what happens after a hurricane passes through? The coasts have all the clues and can tell us some important informati...
10/09/2026

So what happens after a hurricane passes through? The coasts have all the clues and can tell us some important information. Join Nina Stark, Ph.D. professor and director of the UF Center for Coastal Solutions as she shares how her research team collected field data following Hurricanes Helene and Milton in 2024 during a presentation hosted by the NSF's Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure webinar series. Registration is required!

In this NHERI Presents webinar, learn how teams bring different measurements together to understand how storm surge erodes shorelines, washes away sediment and causes soil to fail and how those changes affect natural areas and structures.

When: October 21, 2026
Time: 1 p.m. to 1:30 p.m. CT
Register now at https://designsafe-ci.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_V9lV-oXPRlq3lV064NuWlA #/registration



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