I'm Lexi Jones-Kellett, a Postdoctoral Associate in the Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences (EAPS) Department at MIT,
working in the Darwin Project Group led by Dr. Mick Follows. My research lies in the
discipline of computational oceanography, focusing on the role of mesoscale (10s-100s km) circulations in shaping plankton community
composition and biogeography. I ultimately seek to understand how biological-physical interactions in the ocean aggregate to support
the global carbon cycle and the food web. Through this work, I use a combination of satellite remote sensing observations,
in situ observations (e.g. amplicon sequencing, flow cytometry, autonomous vehicles), and numerical simulations. My favorite tool is
Lagrangian trajectory analysis, which is a method of tracking the transport of water parcels through space and time. More details on my
specific projects can be found on the Research page.
Lagrangian trajectories of waters around the Hawaiian Islands, calculated from satellite-estimated ocean current velocities.
Background
I hold a Ph.D. in Biological Oceanography from the MIT-WHOI Joint Program (2025) and a B.A. in Mathematics with Minors in Physics and
Business from Temple University (2018). My research career began in Dr. Rob Kulthinal's Evolutionary
Genetics and Biological Informatics lab at Temple University where I learned to code in Python while studying genetic variation in
the Drosophila lineage (fruit flies) and the evolution of duplicate genes and their functions. I then worked on a project examining
phytoplankton composition in the Santa Barbara Channel and the community response to marine heatwaves with ocean color remote sensing
algorithms through the NASA Student Airborne Research Project (SARP). Additionally, I led a NASA DEVELOP remote sensing study investigating
the ocean conditions driving the northward migration of the grunion, a fish endemic to Southern California. These early projects sparked my
interest in oceanography and ultimately inspired me to pursue a Ph.D. in the field. I am a staunch supporter of open science practices, and a
fan of Python and Jupyter Notebooks. You can find my code on GitHub. My
research publications are open-access and generated datasets are publicly available.
