At a Glance

Name: Chi-Hin LAM, or Tim Lam
Contacts: chihinl@usc.edu
Department: Marine Environmental Biology, USC Biology
Undergraduate: Northwestern University, Evanston, IL
Home country: Hong Kong
Nickname: dolphintim
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Research Interests

My research focuses on analyzing data collected from data storage satellite tags attached to marine pelagic animals that spend most of their time submerged underwater. The intent is to better understand the migratory behavior and spatial stock structure of large pelagics. Right now, the technological limitation is that GPS signal transmission is unavailable for submerged tags, and positions can only be estimated through calculations on ambient light data recorded by a tag. Two main aspects of analytical work are 1) improving position estimates with other environmental data, such as sea surface temperature or currents; 2) characterizing habitat preferences of tagged animals in their 3-D environment with time.

I am conducting studies on improving position estimates, by comparing the performance of major geolocation improvement algorithms or models that utilize other environmental data to improve position estimates. This work will also look at the usage and quality of different remote sensing products that these improvement algorithms or models utilize. The aim of this work is to find out, given for a particular type of tagging operation, which algorithm and remote sensing product will give the best answer to a particularly research question (coastal migration/ long-range movements etc.). I am also interested in exploring and modeling the interaction of individuals and populations, and the environment through time.

Other interests

I am particularly fond of cross-fertilizing my research ideas and designs with the analytical frameworks, concepts and practices of business. I am interested in business strategies and change management. I also find inspirations from art and design (thanks to my girlfriend), and look for ways to incorporate them in my work.