Ryan J. Hanscom, PhD

Ryan J. Hanscom, PhD       

Assistant Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

Marine Sciences Building Room 205

801 Carteret St

Beaufort, SC 29902

Office: Coming soon

rhanscom@uscb.edu

CV_Hanscom.pdf

I am a broadly trained behavioral ecologist focused on understanding how vertebrates — particularly snakes, turtles, and small mammals — respond to environmental variation across space and time. My research program integrates next-generation natural history techniques through biologging (most prominently accelerometry, miniaturized GPS and temperature logging, and radio telemetry) to quantify animal behavior, movement and physiology of free-ranging individuals. Much of my current work centers on the behavioral ecology of pitvipers across barrier island, sea island, and mainland habitats, exploring how predator-prey interactions, individual behavioral variation, and environmental/thermal landscapes shape their behavior. My long-term goal is to link behavioral and physiological data at fine scales to inform broader questions about species persistence and adaptation in rapidly changing ecosystems, with an emphasis on coastal environments of South Carolina.