Although senior Chris Henry regards New England clam chowder as "the most delicious thing on earth," his love for marine life runs deeper than soup.

A biology major concentrating in marine biology, Henry has harbored a lifelong love for the ocean—seaweed and hermit crabs, in particular. When he traveled to the French Polynesian island of Moorea through Northeastern's Three Seas Program, he uncovered his new favorite species: the sea urchin.

For his senior project, Henry is investigating the effect of codium—an invasive algae that chokes out local seaweed—on the sea urchin population, and, consequently, on other marine life that depends on the urchins.

"Urchins have a significant community-wide effect because they are a big part of the diets of a lot of commercially fished species, especially lobsters," Henry says. "Codium essentially creates underwater deserts, where urchins have been shown to perform poorly. So, if codium continues to develop, the species will be in trouble, which will reduce the stability of the whole system."

His work is still in progress, but next up for Henry is grad school. "My focus is broad, but I like urchins and that whole phylum. I had to do a lot of work and research for my project, but it's a good validation of the fact that I've learned something, that I have an actual base to build on."

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