Dr. Moeller is a theoretical ecologist who uses mathematical and empirical approaches to understand acquired metabolism. "Originally trained as a photophysiologist and phytoplankton ecologist, she built her mathematical toolkit as a masters student in the MIT/Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Joint Program working on marine reserve bioeconomics. As a PhD student, she studied the ancient and diverse metabolic mutualism between trees and ectomycorrhizal fungi.
The Moeller lab uses a combination of mathematical models, field observations, and lab experiments to figure out how acquired metabolism (when organisms gain access to metabolic pathways that aren’t hard-wired into their own DNA) changes the dynamics of living communities, and what ecological pressures lead to the evolution and maintenance of these acquisitions.