Rate My Professor Elka Porter

Elka T. Porter serves as Associate Professor of Marine Science and Chair of the Marine Science Department at St. Mary's College of Maryland. She holds a Ph.D. in Marine-Estuarine-Environmental Sciences from the University of Maryland, College Park, a Diplom (M.S. equivalent) in Zoology with minors in Physical Oceanography and Botany from Christian-Albrechts-Universität Kiel, Germany, and a B.S. in Biology from the same university. Her career includes postdoctoral research on physical-biological-chemical interactions, summer research assistantships at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, research assistance for Ken Sebens on corals including a saturation Hydrolab mission in the Florida Keys, and instructing courses such as the Ecology of the Chesapeake Bay. Porter has earned the University of Baltimore Yale Gordon College of Arts and Sciences Distinguished Scholarship Award in 2019 and the University of Baltimore Award Certificate of Best Collaboration of Professor with Undergraduate Supplemental Instructor in 2014.

Porter's research examines the effects of water flow and organisms on sediment-water interactions, focusing on benthic-pelagic coupling processes and their impacts on water quality, particularly in the Chesapeake Bay. She studies physical-biological-chemical interactions, influences of oysters and hard clams, tidal resuspension, shear turbulence, and climate change-related storm increases on nutrient dynamics, oxygen levels, phytoplankton, microphytobenthos, zooplankton, seston, and ecosystem processes. Porter developed shear turbulence resuspension mesocosms (STURM) to simulate realistic tidal and storm conditions. Key publications include Porter ET, Cornwell JC (2023) Mesocosm Approaches to the Examination of Benthic-Pelagic Coupling, with emphasis on turbulence in Limnology and Oceanography; Porter ET et al. (2022) Effect of tidal resuspension with oyster biodeposits on the nutrient and oxygen dynamics in Marine Ecology Progress Series; Porter ET et al. (2020) Effects of hard clam density and bottom shear stress on cohesive sediment erodibility in Journal of Marine Research; and additional works on oyster biodeposits resuspension, valve gape behavior, and STURM applications from 2010 to 2018. At the Patuxent Environmental & Aquatic Research Laboratory, she mentors students in summer research leading to theses and presentations.