My expertise is primarily focused in the programing language R for data manipulation, visualization, spatial and statistical analysis. I host R vignettes on my blog which features a wide range of topics mostly focused on data applications for aquatic scientist. Currently, my work is focused on large acoustic telemetry datasets, stable isotope analysis, bioenergetic models, and length-at-age datasets. I have experience in frequentist and Bayesian statistical approaches (i.e., using JAGS and Stan) and have expertise in using parametric and non-parametric statistical tools, GLMMs, GAMMs, spatial and temporal auto-correlated data, and zero-inflated models. Lastly, I have experience with databases and database management using Python, SQL, quarto, and shiny.

I maintain and authored the following packages:

{trps} – Bayesian trophic position models using Stan (pronounced tropes) by leveraging {brms}. Equations for trophic position models are derived from Post (2002), Vander Zanden and Vadeboncoeur (2002), and Heuvel et al. (2024) and are to be used with stable isotope data.


{nichetools} – is a complementary package to {nicheROVER} and {SIBER} which are both focused on evaluating stable isotope niches and food web community metrics.

{ecotox} – uses a simple approach to analyze data from toxicology studies to find lethal concentrations (LC) or time (LT) for a given reagent.

I have also contributed to the following packages:

  1. {glatos} — acoustic telemetry data processing
  2. {pathroutr} — rerouting animal movements around landmasses
  3. {soapcheckr} — efficiently making soap-film smoothers for GAMs in {mgcv},
  4. {tRophicPosition} — addresses estimating trophic position using equations found in Post et al., 2002 using a Bayesian framework in JAGS
  5. {TelemetrySpace} – Bayesian detection probability models in Stan
  6. {rvdat} – R API to interface with vdat from Innovasea’s Fathom Connect
  7. {rvdat-docker} – Docker container to interact with vdat from Innovasea’s Fathom Connect.

Contact info: benjamin.hlina@gmail.com