Paridhi Rustogi Earns Top Honors at International Conference on Global Oceans in a Changing Climate

Paridhi Rustogi was delighted when she learned she’d been accepted to the 2025 GOOD-OARS International Summer School. A fifth-year Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Geosciences and a fellow in the HMEI Climate and Environmental Sciences and Engineering Program (CESEn), Rustogi was one of only 35 scholars from about 20 countries invited to gather at the University of Malaysia’s Centre for Marine and Coastal Studies last November to study how the ocean is responding to a changing climate.

The program featured lectures by key researchers studying ocean acidification, deoxygenation, and hypoxia from observational and modelling perspectives. Participants carried out fieldwork in the coastal waters—conducting water-column surveys, sediment and blue-carbon assessments, and analyzing samples for biogeochemical variables, including nutrients, temperature, salinity, and oxygen. In another experiment, participants observed how fish respond to the compound stress of rising temperatures and reduced oxygen levels, which is an increasingly worrisome global threat.

Rustogi studies the role of waves and bubbles in air-sea gas exchange in the Resplandy Research Group on Ocean Biogeochemistry. In 2025, Rustogi was the lead author of a paper exploring the influence of waves and bubbles on ocean carbon, advised by Prof. Laure Resplandy. She was also co-author of a paper led by Prof. Luc Deike (HMEI and Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering) in which they connected bubbles formed during wave breaking to ocean oxygen. The ocean is increasingly described as “losing its breath,” as gases become less soluble in a warming climate. The week-long program in Malaysia offered a chance to engage with the latest research from leaders in the field.

As an ocean modeler who primarily works at a desk, Rustogi says that her appreciation of people who collect field observations has grown immensely after having spent just a few hours on a boat in the Straits of Malacca.

In addition to learning, participants were also tapped to teach. Each attendee presented a short talk on their ongoing research. Experts in attendance would provide real-time feedback, and two presentations would receive awards. Rustogi presented her research investigating the influence of waves and bubbles on oxygen in the ocean interior—work funded by the HMEI CESEn Fellowship and co-supervised by Prof. Resplandy and Prof. Deike. When the students’ votes were counted, she took the Best Presentation Award. In addition to her prize-winning individual presentation, her group also earned the Best Group Report Award for their synthesis of fieldwork and laboratory experiments examining the ecologically critical coastal environment around Penang Island.

While Rustogi was pleased for her research presentation to win, she says the most rewarding part of the experience was the chance to learn alongside others studying the ocean. “It was incredibly heartening to connect with fellow early-career researchers and to interact directly with field practitioners and lecturers,” she said.

Rustogi’s participation in the 2025 GOOD-OARS International Summer Schoolwas made possible through the generous support of HMEI’ William Clay Ford, Jr. ’79 and Lisa Vanderzee Ford ’82 Graduate CESEn Fellowship Fund.