Title: Assistant Professor, Coastal Carolina University, Department of Biology
Expertise: Functional Morphology, Fishes, Elasmobranchs, Biomechanics
ORCID: 0000-0002-7225-8137
Involvement in NoCTURN: Open Science and Education and Outreach
Introduction
Today, we’re featuring Dr. Callie Crawford, a functional morphologist based at Coastal Carolina University. Dr. Crawford has been using CT scanning in her work since 2011 and is a member of NoCTURN’s Open Science Committee and Education and Outreach Community.
Background and Career Journey
Dr. Crawford began her educational journey completing a BS at the University of Rhode Island where she majored in Marine Biology and minored in Wildlife and Conservation Biology and Leadership Studies. As an undergraduate, she gained research experience in a few branches of the tree of life by working on spiders, hemlock trees, sharks, and flounder, but didn’t get into morphology or tomography until her MS degree. As a graduate student at the College of Charleston, Dr. Crawford finally joined the CT community working with Dr. Gavin Naylor on the Chondrichthyan Tree of Life project, collecting CT scans (medical and micro) of as many species as she could get access to and segmenting digital models of their skeletons.
Dr. Crawford also took a few detours in between her undergrad and graduate degrees. After completing her undergraduate degree, she spent a year working. Part of that year was spent at the Port Townsend Marine Science Center as a marine naturalist intern and the other part at Mote Marine Lab as an intern in the sea turtle hospital. Then, after her MS, she spent a year working at Duke University with Dr. Doug Boyer in his Evolutionary Anthropology Lab and in the Pratt School of Engineering as one of their CT Technicians.
Finally, Dr. Crawford got to grad school and completed her PhD at the New Jersey Institute of Technology with Dr. Brooke Flammang. With Dr. Flammang, Dr. Crawford shifted to bony fishes and combined her love of tomography with further work on the biomechanics of fish movement. Dr. Crawford’s dissertation explored the unique pelvic morphology of Balitorid loaches, small rheophilic fishes found in fast flowing rivers and streams across Southeast Asia. During her PhD, Dr. Crawford was able to expand her CT knowledge to staining, using phosphotungstic acid (PTA) to visualize muscles in these fishes in addition to their skeletal morphology. She also had opportunities to train other students in the grad program on CT scanning and segmentation. The other portion of her dissertation focused on the biomechanics of Balitorid loaches locomotion. Some species within this family are able to complete a walk-like locomotion pattern reminiscent of the walking pattern we see in salamanders.
After her PhD, Dr. Crawford spent two years at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, one year as a postdoc with Dr. Emily Kane and the other as a Visiting Assistant Professor. During her postdoc, Dr. Crawford gained experience with 2D morphometrics and feeding kinematics. She also expanded her work to sculpin morphology and research through an opportunity with the Kane lab and Friday Harbor Labs.
After this somewhat meandering path, Dr. Crawford is now at Coastal Carolina University (CCU) as an Assistant Professor of Animal Biology teaching introductory biology and vertebrate zoology. Her research still includes a combination of CT and high-speed video. Dr. Crawford is building her lab and has a few undergraduate students and a graduate student working on kinematics and tomography data.
NoCTURN has given Dr. Crawford a way to stay connected with the CT scanning network while not having direct access to a scanner in her current position.
Involvement with NoCTURN
Dr. Crawford joined NoCTURN in the spring of 2023. She first joined the Education and Outreach Community, jumping into the education kit development which was underway in the community. At the spring in-person network meeting in 2024, Dr. Crawford joined the Open Science Committee and has been helping the team with a manuscript on open science in non-clinical tomography. Most recently she assisted Dr. Paul Gignac and Dr. Leigha Lynch with a workshop, “From Specimens to CT Datasets” run at the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology (SICB) at the 2025 meeting held in Atlanta, Georgia.
Passion for the Field
Being able to use tomography to digitally dissect chondrichthyan specimens during her masters degree was the first time Dr. Crawford was truly excited about research and that excitement to use this technique and learn more applications still hasn’t waned, even after 14 years (with a few gaps between scanning opportunities). Dr. Crawford hopes to continue working with collaborators and members of NoCTURN to increase accessibility to tomography whether through developing accessible kits or simply making morphology easier to digest for outreach programs. The increasingly easy access to scan data through Morphosource and software for modeling and analysis like SlicerMorph are exciting advances in non-clinical tomography and Dr. Crawford is excited for their continued growth and use by researchers, educators, and the curious public.
Personal Interests and Hobbies
Outside of academia, Dr. Crawford spends time working with other outreach and community groups including Minorities in Shark Sciences (MISS) and Skype-A-Scientist. She is part of a weekly crafting group (sometimes more crafting, sometimes more socializing) and tries to swim laps whenever she has the time and energy. Much of her spare time is spent with her two cats, Willow and Cricket.
Advice for Emerging Researchers
Dr. Crawford’s advice for emerging researchers is to follow your curiosity, find what makes you excited to stay up late researching (but remember to keep that work-life balance at the forefront!). The interconnectivity of science is a strength that is continuously growing. Don’t be held back because there isn’t someone local who does the work you are interested in. Look broadly. Collaborations can be done from just about anywhere!
Final Thoughts
Looking ahead, Dr. Crawford is excited to continue working in non-clinical tomography and is eager to increase her involvement with NoCTURN. She hopes to continue to introduce students to research opportunities available within the field. Working with CT scans was the “aha” moment in her scientific trajectory and she hopes to share that excitement with others.