North Carolina Sea Grant and NC Space Grant have awarded 2026 Sea to Stars Research Fellowships to Robin Newton and Madeline Payne. Newton will investigate how new data from a recent NASA mission can inform wetland protections, and Payne will be working with aerial images to assess overlooked losses of sea grass.

The joint fellowship provides students with the opportunity to pursue interdisciplinary research addressing current challenges for North Carolina’s coastal and watershed ecosystems. Fellowship recipients use relevant instruments or remote-sensing data resources from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

“There are synergies across NASA and NOAA,” says Sandy Canfield, assistant director of NC Space Grant. “The tools and technologies that are publicly available allow users to explore our planet and analyze incredible data sources. This fellowship enables students to propose unique research questions that take advantage of these resources from NASA and NOAA.”

“Ground-Truthing NISAR Coastal Wetland Products Using Drone-based LiDAR Remote Sensing at the Rachel Carson Reserve, North Carolina”

Newton, a doctoral researcher in Marine Science and Conservation at Duke University, will be working with brand new data from NASA’s new NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar (NISAR) satellite. Launched in July of 2025, the goal of the NISAR mission is to track and monitor various ecosystems to provide clearer insights into the changes happening on Earth’s surface.

“When NISAR launched last year, I saw an opportunity,” says Newton. “Tidal marshes are vital to so many ecosystem functions yet so vulnerable to flooding and encroaching tides, and that kind of monitoring tool is exactly what a barrier-island system like the Rachel Carson Reserve needs.”

NISAR uses radar waves to measure changes in land, vegetation, water and ice on the surface of the Earth. In theory, the satellite could be an essential tool for monitoring and preserving shifting ecosystems, like those along the North Carolina coast.

“The catch,” Newton says, “is that nobody has tested whether NISAR actually works in barrier-island habitats like ours. The sites NASA uses for accuracy testing are mostly river delta and tidal river marsh systems, which look quite different from a barrier island, structurally.”

Newton’s findings will be essential to helping the Rachel Carson Reserve staff manage and protect these fragile wetland ecosystems. The models that Newton provides will complement their existing methods, allowing them to make better informed decisions regarding ongoing and future restoration projects.

“It’s exciting that Newton will be ground-truthing — verifying data captured remotely through satellites matches with on the ground observations — right here on the Carolina coast,” says Canfield.

Newton says her work could lead to new options for programs with limited resources. “The Rachel Carson Reserve and other barrier island managers along the South Atlantic could have free satellite monitoring that tells them where habitats are changing between field visits.”

“Quantifying hidden seagrass loss: fine-scale change detection in two U.S. estuarine systems”

Payne, a Ph.D. candidate in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Environment, Ecology, and Energy Program, will investigate what she calls “hidden seagrass loss” in the Albemarle-Pamlico Estuary System in North Carolina and the Chandeleur Islands of Louisiana.

“This project grew from conversations with my advisor about what we actually mean when we call seagrass ‘patchy,’” says Payne. “The more I dug into the existing survey data, the more I realized that seagrass could be quietly disappearing in ways that only fine-scale mapping can reveal. For a habitat so ecologically important, this felt like a gap worth closing.”

Current seagrass maps classify areas as continuously covered, patchy (covering between 10 percent and 70 percent of an area), or no seagrass. In the past, researchers have only relied on changes in classification from continuous or patchy to no seagrass to estimate seagrass losses, overlooking the transition from continuous to patchy and losses occurring within the patchy category itself.

Payne will use aerial images to identify these transitions and quantify the seagrass loss that is currently overlooked.

“Beyond the science itself, I’m genuinely excited about the people, partnerships, and tools this project will bring together,” says Payne. “I’m really looking forward to mentoring an undergraduate researcher as part of this project, giving them hands-on experience with remote sensing techniques and real research questions while helping them build connections in the coastal science community.”

“Payne is an effective science communicator,” says Canfield, “and I look forward to seeing how her research will engage local stakeholders, help researchers and policymakers, and educate young students on seagrass ecology and coastal conservation.”

Not only will Payne’s analysis provide key insights for the Albemarle-Pamlico National Estuary Partnership, who maintain and restore ecosystems across the estuary system, but she will also work with SciREN Coast to develop an adaptable lesson plan for K-12 students. This lesson will engage students in identifying differences in habitat, helping to build long-term environmental literacy.

This will be Payne’s third fellowship with North Carolina Sea Grant. She previously served as the Hook, Line & Science Communication Fellow and as joint fellow for North Carolina Sea Grant and the Albemarle-Pamlico National Estuary Partnership.

Partnership with Louisiana

The fellowship offers a unique opportunity for collaboration, as the North Carolina Space Grant and Sea Grant Programs are partnering with the Louisiana Sea Grant to fund graduate fellows in both states.

While each state’s fellows pursue independent research projects, they will be able to work collaboratively as a cohort to share insights and knowledge throughout the fellowship. This exchange not only enhances the research capabilities of both programs but also promotes interdisciplinary approaches to tackling issues of coastal resilience across different geographic and ecological contexts.

“Working regionally allows the study of a larger area of habitat types, environmental conditions, and existing management strategies,” says John Fear, deputy director of North Carolina Sea Grant. “This bigger-picture perspective will hopefully make the results of each project more relevant across many areas, not just where the work took place.”

Learn more about the Sea-Space Research Fellowship.

Read about last year’s fellowship recipient.