NCCOS Staff

Doucette serves as Program Lead for HAB Sensor Development in the Harmful Algal Bloom (HAB) Monitoring & Reference Branch. This effort focuses on developing and deploying field-portable and autonomous, in-situ sensor technologies to detect and measure HAB toxin levels in U.S. coastal waters, including the Great Lakes.

Doucette began his work on HABs as a post-doctoral researcher at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (1989-92). He joined NOAA’s Marine Biotoxins Program in Charleston, SC as a U.S. National Research Council Associate in 1992, and has held a Research Oceanographer position at NOAA’s NCCOS Charleston Laboratory since 1999. His research on HABs has covered diverse topics, including algal toxin assay development, HAB ecophysiology, algicidal bacteria-HAB interactions, toxin trophic transfer, molecular probes for HAB species, and developing sensors for HAB toxin detection deployed on field-portable and uncrewed platforms. He has published over 115 peer-reviewed articles and more than a dozen book chapters across these subject areas. Doucette and two NOAA (NMFS, OAR) collaborators were recognized with DOC’s Gold Medal (2018) and the Gears of Government Presidential Award (2019), “For pioneering advanced toxin sensor technology to protect U.S. communities…” and he along with several NOS colleagues received the NOAA Administrator’s Award (2021), “For leadership envisioning the nation’s first National Harmful Algal Bloom Observing Network.”

Doucette received his B.Sc. in Biology from Bowling Green State University (OH) in 1979, his M.Sc. in Oceanography from Texas A&M University in 1982, and his Ph.D. in Botany from the University of British Columbia in 1989.