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August 31, 2003

Highlights

  • Runa Marteinsdottir, visiting scientist from Iceland, was in the States, working for a few weeks out of Blake Hall. She has a joint appointment with the University of Iceland and the Iceland Marine Research Institute. Runa received her PhD from Rutgers in 1991 (advisor Ken Able).
  • Alan Robock has been elected to the International Commission on the Middle Atmosphere (ICMA) of the International Association for Meteorology and Atmospheric Sciences (IAMAS), for the period 2003 - 2007. ICMA is one of the ten commissions of IAMAS. ICMA is devoted to encouraging international cooperation in research on the science of the middle atmosphere - from the near tropopause region to the lower thermosphere. ICMA's main activities are organizing middle atmosphere-related sessions at the Assemblies of IUGG, IAMAS and IAGA.
  • In August, Joanna Burger and Michael Gochfeld organized several stakeholder meetings at Aleut villages from Atka to Unalaska to explain the Consortium for Risk Evaluation with Stakeholder Participation (CRESP) science plan for the biologic, hydrologic, and geologic investigations of the marine environment around Amchitka Island where the Atomic Energy Commission conducted three underground nuclear tests from 1965 to 1971. Huge quantities of short- and long-lived radionuclides are sequestered in the rock cavities and have the potential to migrate into the sea and contaminate the littoral ecosystem. Attendees voiced their concerns and provided guidance on subsistence foods and techniques on which many Aleuts depend. The adjacent Bering Sea supports the world's most productive commercial fishery. The studies will begin in 2004.
  • Judith Weis: "During the first week of August I participated in a review of the Hawaii Sea Grant program. Having traveled that far to spend most of the time sitting in rooms, I took a week's vacation in Kawai before stopping in San Francisco for the board meeting of the Association for Women in Science (AWIS) and then returning home as soon as the blackout was over."

Meetings Attended

  • Ken Able gave a presentation on Aug. 19 at the 27th Annual Larval Fish Conference, Santa Cruz, Calif. "Sources and sinks for Fundulus heteroclitus (mummichog) in salt marshes: impact of invasive Phragmites australis (common reed)," co-authors Stacy M. Hagan and Steven Brown.
  • Alan Robock gave an invited lecture at Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, July 29, 2003 on Volcanic Eruptions and Climate: Winter Warming and Summer Cooling.
  • Bonnie McCay (Dept. of Human Ecology) participated in a workshop on Vulnerability of Coastal Communities, held at Change Islands, Newfoundland, August 23-25, 2003. She spoke about the vulnerability and sources of resilience of fishing communities of Fogo Island, Newfoundland.
  • Alan Robock made the following conference presentations: 1)Arctic Oscillation Response to the 1991 Pinatubo Eruption in the SKYHI GCM with a Realistic Quasi-Biennial Oscillation (invited presentation; with Georgiy L. Stenchikov, Kevin Hamilton V. Ramaswamy, and M. Daniel Schwarzkopf; XXIII General Assembly of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics, Sapporo, Japan, June 30 July 11, 2003). 2)Climatic Impacts of Volcanic Gas Emissions (invited presentation; with Georgiy L. Stenchikov; XXIII General Assembly of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics, Sapporo, Japan, June 30 July 11, 2003). 3)Decadal Soil Moisture Variations in The Ukraine: 45 Years of In Situ Observations Compared to Climate Model Simulations and NCEP/NCAR and ERA40 Reanalyses (with Mingquan MU, Konstantin Y. Vinnikov, Iryna Trofimova, Tatiana Adamenko, Pedro Viterbo, and Thomas Atkins; XXIII General Assembly of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics, Sapporo, Japan, June 30 July 11, 2003). 4)Stratospheric and Tropospheric Forcing of the Arctic Oscillation by the 1991 Mt. Pinatubo Eruption (invited presentation; with Georgiy L. Stenchikov, Kevin Hamilton, V. Ramaswamy, M. Daniel Schwarzkopf; presented by Kevin Hamilton; XXIII General Assembly of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics, Sapporo, Japan, June 30 July 11, 2003). 5)Volcanic eruptions and climate: Winter warming and summer cooling (invited presentation: Gordon Research Conference on Solar Radiation and Climate, New London, New Hampshire, July 13-18, 2003).

New Grants

  • Paul Falkowski and Maxim Gorbunov have been awarded a $1M contract from the DoD Strategic Environmental Research and Development (SERDP) program. The project entitled "Analysis of Biophysical, Optical and Genetic Diversity of DoD Coral Reef Communities using Advanced Fluorescence and Molecular Biology Techniques" focuses on (1) the development of bio-optical techniques for rapid, and non-destructive assessment of the viability and health of coral reef communities; (2) the development of submersible fluorosensors for permanent underwater monitoring stations and Remote Operated Vehicles; and (3) the collection of an extensive library of baseline data on physiological, biophysical, bio-optical and genetic diversity of coral reef communities near DoD installations in three major geographic areas. The project is conducted in collaboration with Dr. Mike Matz from Whitney Marine Lab., University of Florida.
  • A grant has been awarded to Rutgers University for "An Integrated Biogeographic Information System for Knowledge Discovery in Bioinformatics" effective September 1, 2003. The project is under the direction of Yunqing (Phoebe) Zhang and J. Frederick Grassle. This a continuing grant which is funded in FY 2003 for $100,000 and approved for funding for an additional two years at $200,000 per year (total $500,000).

Publications

  • Bidle, K.D., R.A. Long, J. Jones, M.A. Brzezinski and F. Azam. Diminished efficiency of the oceanic silica pump by bacterially-mediated silica dissolution. Limnol. Oceanogr. 48:1855-1868.
  • M.A. Brzezinski, J. Jones, Bidle, K.D. and F. Azam. The balance between silica production and silica dissolution in the sea. Insights from Monterey Bay, California applied to a global data set. Limnol. Oceanogr. 48:1846-1854.
  • Roads, John, Richard Lawford, E. Bainto, Ernesto Berbery, Shyh-Chin Chen, Balazs M. Fekete, Kevin Gallo, Andrew Grundstein, Wayne Higgins, Masao Kanamitsu, W. Krajewski, Venkat Lakshmi, D. Leathers, Dennis Lettenmaier, L. Luo, Edwin Maurer, Tilden Meyers, D. Miller, Kenneth Mitchell, T. Mote, Rachel Pinker, T. Reichler, David Robinson, Alan Robock, James Smith, G. Srinivasan, Konstantin Vinnikov, Thomas Vonder Haar, Charles J. Vorosmarty, S. Williams, and E. Yarosh, 2003: GCIP Water and Energy Budget Synthesis (WEBS). J. Geophys. Res., in press.
  • Robock, Alan, Lifeng Luo, Eric F. Wood, Fenghua Wen, Kenneth E. Mitchell, Paul R. Houser, John C. Schaake, Dag Lohmann, Brian Cosgrove, Justin Sheffield, Qingyun Duan, R. Wayne Higgins, Rachel T. Pinker, J. Dan Tarpley, Jeffrey B. Basara, and Kenneth C. Crawford, 2003: Evaluation of the North American Land Data Assimilation System over the Southern Great Plains during the warm season. J. Geophys. Res., in press.
  • Luo, Lifeng, Alan Robock, Kenneth E. Mitchell, Paul R. Houser, Eric F. Wood, John C. Schaake, Dag Lohmann, Brian Cosgrove, Fenghua Wen, Justin Sheffield, Qingyun Duan, R. Wayne Higgins, Rachel T. Pinker, and J. Dan Tarpley, 2003: Validation of the North American Land Data Assimilation System (NLDAS) retrospective forcing over the Southern Great Plains. J. Geophys. Res., in press.
  • Cosgrove, Brian A., Dag Lohmann, Kenneth E. Mitchell, Paul R. Houser, Eric F. Wood, John Schaake, Alan Robock, Curtis Marshall, Justin Sheffield, Lifeng Luo, Qingyun Duan, Rachel Pinker, J. Dan Tarpley, R. Wayne Higgins, and Jesse Meng, 2003: Realtime and retrospective forcing in the North American Land Data Assimilation Systems (NLDAS) project. J. Geophys. Res., in press.
  • Sheffield, Justin, Ming Pan, Eric F. Wood, Kenneth E. Mitchell, Paul R. Houser, John C. Schaake, Alan Robock, Dag Lohmann, Brian Cosgrove, Qingyun Duan, Lifeng Luo, R. Wayne Higgins, Rachel Pinker, J. Dan Tarpley, and Bruce H. Ramsay, 2003: Snow process modeling in the North American Land Data Assimilation System (NLDAS), Part I: Evaluation of model simulated snow cover extent. J. Geophys. Res., in press.
  • Pinker, Rachel T., J. Dan Tarpley, Istvan Laszlo, Kenneth E. Mitchell, Paul R. Houser, Eric F. Wood, John C. Schaake, Alan Robock, Dag Lohmann, Brian A. Cosgrove, Justin Sheffield, Qingyun Duan, Lifeng Luo, and R. Wayne Higgins, 2003: Surface radiation budgets in support of the GEWEX Continental Scale International Project (GCIP) and the GEWEX Americas Prediction Project (GAPP), including the North American Land Data Assimilation System (NLDAS) project. J. Geophys. Res., in press.
  • Antua, Juan Carlos, Alan Robock, Georgiy Stenchikov, Jun Zhou, Christine David, John Barnes, and Larry Thomason, 2003: Spatial and temporal variability of the stratospheric aerosol cloud produced by the 1991 Mount Pinatubo eruption. J. Geophys. Res., in press.
  • Robock, Alan, 2003: Preface to special section: GEWEX Continental-Scale International Project (GCIP)-3, J. Geophys. Res., 108(_), XXXX, doi:10.1029/2003JD003924, in press.
  • Textor, Christiane, Hans-F. Graf, Claudia Timmreck, and Alan Robock, 2003: Emissions from volcanoes, Chapter 11 of Emissions of Chemical Compounds and Aerosols in the Atmosphere, Claire Granier, Claire Reeves, and Paulo Artaxo, Eds., (Kluwer, Dordrecht), in press.
  • Robock, Alan, 2003: Introduction: Mount Pinatubo as a test of climate feedback mechanisms, in Volcanism and the Earths Atmosphere, Alan Robock and Clive Oppenheimer, Eds. (American Geophysical Union, Washington, DC), in press.

Student News

  • Gregg Sakowicz, a Master's student (advisor Ken Able) in Ecology & Evolution successfully defended his thesis on July 15: Comparative morphology and behavior of larval salt marsh fishes: Fundulus heteroclitus and Cyprinodon variegatus. Gregg had a two-year NOAA/NERR fellowship, and is now employed by the Jacques Cousteau NERR.
  • Welcome new Ecology & Evolution PhD student, Matt Kimball, who will be working with Ken Able at the Marine Field Station. Matt comes from North Carolina State University, where he just completed his master's degree under the tutelage of Jon Hare.
  • Brian Gaas: "I hail from the other side of the world...or what might as well be- Texas. My undergraduate education was at Texas A&M, where I received a double B.S. in biochemistry and genetics, with a minor in philosophy. My project, as part of Dr. Ammerman's lab, is the development and deployment of a continuous, automated, enzyme-based measurement system. We are specifically looking at potential phosphorus limitation in the Gulf of Mexico, but the application extends to other enzyme-based assays and aquatic systems as well. When outside of the lab (and who do I think I'm kidding?) I spend my time reading (fantasy and sci-fi), playing games (computer, RPG, and other "gamer's games"), playing the piano/marimba, caving, and participating in any other outdoor activity I have the means to pursue. My home away from home is in the IMCS building, room 303A, x305."
  • Weifeng (Gordon) Zhang (Dale Haidvogel, advisor): "In March, I received my Master degree majoring in Fluid Mechanics from Zhejiang University, China. And I got my Bachelor degree from this university in June 2000. My research interests are Large-scale ocean circulation, air-sea interaction, and polar oceanography. My hobbies are tennis, badminton, and hiking. Currently, I live in Starkey Apartment 547D, Cook campus." (Room 214 IMCS)
  • Kyle Kingman: "I graduated from Rutgers with a degree in geology and marine science. My research interests are focused on the marine geology of continental margins. My advisor is Dr. Peter Rona. I am also working on developing exploration and research methods to improve the observation of light sensitive marine species in the lab and in nature using night vision technology. Personally, I enjoy anything to do with the outdoors, fishing, flying, skiing, camping, canoeing, kayaking, hiking, rock hunting, exploring of any sort, playing guitar, and riding motorcycles. My office (tentatively) is at Geological sciences, room 233E. I do not have an office or desk at IMCS yet. My home phone is (732) 469-0046."
  • Carrie Fraser (Lee Kerkhof, advisor): "My name is Carrie Fraser and I am in 305E. I am originally from this area but have been living in Washington, DC for the past six years. I received a BS in Biology from The George Washington University in 2001 and then worked for a small biotech company. From these experiences, I came to appreciate microbiology and now hope to focus on marine microbial ecology."
  • Hui Liu (Colomban deVargas, advisor): "My name is Hui Liu, I'm from China and I completed my BS degree in Xiamen University with a major in Oceanography. My research interests focus on molecular evolution and phylogenetics in open ocean organisms, mainly about phytoplankton such as coccolithophores. My room number is 305A and my phone is ext. 334. When I'm free I like to play the piano, go traveling, and listen to music."

Let's Welcome

  • Lin Jiang: "I graduated from the graduate program of ecology and evolution at Rutgers this past April, under the supervision of Dr. Peter Morin. I am interested in a variety of fundamental questions in population and community ecology, and I use both models and experiments to address these questions. For the next two years, I will be working on the biocomplexity project, 'The evolution and radiation of eucaryotic phytoplankton taxa.' " (Room 303E IMCS)

Congratulations

  • Maxim Gorbunov has been promoted to Associate Research Professor.
  • Goodbye to Tuckerton postdocs Dewayne Fox and Martha Jones. Martha leaves us for a tenure-track faculty position at the University College of Cape Breton in her native Nova Scotia. Dewayne also leaves for a tenure-track faculty position at Delaware State University, Dover.