Field Station Faculty

Dr. Gaines received her Ph.D. in 2003 from the University of South Carolina's Normal J. Arnold School of Public Health and has been a faculty member of the Field Station since that time. She worked on the Savannah River Site for a decade and currently is on faculty at Eastern Illinois University.

Dr. Gaines' research interests primarily focus on wildlife toxicology at the landscape level. Most of her work involves developing spatial models that predict how different wildlife species may be exposed to contaminants such as radionuclides, metals and organics and how that may impact environmental health. Her work also focuses on spatially explicit biokinetic models for a variety of wildlife species. To accomplish this, she studies energy flow within different environmental systems (using stable isotopes). Dr. Gaines applies her research by developing tools within a Geographic Information System (GIS) framework to aid in ecological risk assessments. She works closely with and has been funded by the Department of Energy (DOE), U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), as well as other national and international organizations.