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September 30,
2005
Highlights
- Congratulations to Paul Falkowski who was presented to the Rutgers
Board of Governors for designation as a Board of Governors' Professor
at the Board's October 6 meeting! This designation is the University's
highest academic honor.
- IMCS was invited by the Office of Naval Research to host their
Fall 2005 Northeast Region Progress Review (26-29 September 2005).
During these four days, ONR managers heard progress reports from
their PIs, as well as from five researchers at Rutgers who are
not ONR funded. The ONR funded Rutgers PIs are Oscar Schofield,
Hernan Arango, Dale Haidvogel, and Julia Levin. The five invited
speakers were Robert Chant, Miriam Katz, Joshua Kohut, Kay Bidle,
and Jennifer Francis. Postdocs and graduate students were also
invited to an informal reception to meet and chat with the ONR
program managers.
- Paul Falkowski and colleagues have made it to CNN and Nature,
to read "Study:Oxygen helped mammals grow," from The
Associated Press click on Falkowski_CNN_9-29-05
and "Continental split boosted big mammals," by Philip
Ball click on Falkowski_Nature_9-29-05.
- After New Orleans was flooded in the wake of Hurricane Katrina,
Qizhong (George) Guo was interviewed by MSNBC TV on September
16, 2005 about levee breaches/repairs and city rebuilding.
He pointed out that the surge level did not rise that high
to overtop the floodwalls, causing floodwall breaks, as initially
speculated. Rather, the floodwall breaks were probably caused
by some kind of local structural problems. He suggested that
the levee system be immediately inspected and weak parts be
fixed. He also pointed out that the water level rose less in
the three downtown canals (the 17th Street Canal, Orleans Ave.
Canal, and London Ave. Canal) because of its less direct connection
to the Gulf through Lake Pontchartrain, in comparison to the
larger water level rise in the Industrial Canal (the Inner Harbor
Navigation Canal) because of its more direct connection to the
Gulf through Lake Borgne.
- Sybil Seitzinger traveled to Sweden to advise the Sweden Environmental
Protection Agency on Baltic eutrophication, August 18-26, 2005.
- Peter Rona gave a popular lecture, "Exploring the Deep
Sea Floor," to the Somerset Nature Club in Bound Brook on
September 26th.
- Alan Robock served on a NASA Review Panel on the Land Use/Land
Cover Change research program, held in Silver Spring, Maryland,
Sept. 13-14, 2005.
- Lily Young gave three presentations at FEMS/University of Bologna
sponsored International Summer School, "Biomonitoring, bioavailability
and microbial transformation of pollutants in sediments and approaches
to stimulate their biodegradation," Sept. 12-15, 2005, Genoa,
Italy.
- Alan Robock has been appointed to the Cook College Committee
of Review for a 2-year term beginning July 1, 2005.
- Alan Robock has been appointed to the Northern Eurasian Earth
Science Partnership Initiative (NEESPI) Science Team.
- Alan Robock has won Second Prize in the Weatherwise magazine
2005 Photo Contest. His photo of polar stratospheric clouds over
McMurdo Station, Antarctica, will be published in the September/October
issue of the magazine. You can see the award-winning photo at:
http://climate.envsci.rutgers.edu/Weatherwise/DSCN0927.jpg
- 2005 RUMFS Open House
On October 1st the RUMFS and the Jacques Cousteau National
Estuarine Research Reserve co-sponsored the annual RUMFS Open
House. This once-a-year event helps promote National Estuaries
Day (September 24th) and gives
local residents a chance to learn about what is happening out
at the station. The Open House was held from 10am to 3pm and
was enjoyed by 421 interested locals! (That is 84.2 people per
hour!)
Visitors were given a map of the station and went on self guided
tours. RUMFS staff and JCNERR volunteers were located around
RUMFS to talk about the history of the station, striper tracker,
fish identification, the wet lab, the dive and boat operations,
field research and LEO-15. The event was well covered by the
local press. A big thanks to all JCNERR staff, volunteers and
RUMFS staff for making this year's Open House especially successful!
Pictures of the 2005 Open House can be viewed at: http://www.jcnerr.org/family&public/family&public.htm
Meetings Attended
- Peter Rona presented an invited keynote paper, "New Perspectives
on Deep Ocean Exploration," at the 9th International Geophysical
Congress of the Brazilian Geophysical Society in Salvador, Brazil
on September 14th. His showing (DVD) of the Rutgers IMAX film,
Volcanoes of the Deep Sea, to an audience of students and professionals
at the Congress was a hit.
- Peter Rona presented an invited talk, "Volcanoes of the
Deep Sea: The Science Behind the IMAX Film," at the New Jersey
Science Convention sponsored by the New Jersey Science Teachers
Association on October 5th.
- On Sept. 21, Judith Weis participated in the EPA Science Advisory
Board's committee on Water Quality Criteria, reviewing preliminary
documents on new approaches that the agency plans to take in calculating
water quality criteria for contaminants.
- Sybil Seitzinger was a discussion leader at the Chemical Oceanography
Gordon Research Conference in New Hampshire, August 7-12.
- Sybil Seitzinger attended the National Science Foundation Research
Coordination Network meeting in Virginia, September 11-13. She
presented a poster of the Denitrification Research Coordination
Network program.
- Sybil Seitzinger attended the North American Continental Margins
(Coastal CO2) Workshop in Boulder Colorado, September 20-24. The
meeting was sponsored by the Carbon Cycle Interagency Working
Group (CCIWG;
http://www.carboncyclescience.gov/iwg.html),
NASA, NOAA, and NSF with the goal of determining where carbon
cycling in the ocean margins fits within the Ocean Carbon and
Climate Change program.
- Lily Young attended the Strategic Environmental Research and
Development Program (SERDP) Symposium on Molecular Tools in Environmental
Research, Charlottesville, VA, Aug. 8-10.
- Alan Robock made the following invited presentation: The volcanic
eruption signal in ice cores (Carlsberg Foundation Ice Core Dating
Conference, Copenhagen, Denmark, August 15-17, 2005).
- Alan Robock attended the National Center for Atmospheric Research
Strategic Planning Retreat, Boulder, Colorado, July 25-26, 2005.
New Grants
- Costantino Vetriani has been awarded a SEED grant from the Center
for Environmental and BioInorganic Chemistry (CEBIC) entitled:
"Alkane oxidation in pure cultures and natural microbial
communities from deep-sea hydrothermal vents: linking diversity
and function." $20K. October 1, 2005 - September 30, 2006.
- Ximing Guo and Haiyan Wang. Genetic and ecological structures
of oyster estuaries in China and factors affecting success of
Crassostrea ariakensis: clues from a reclassification.
NOAA/NMFS CBO, $165,680 (12/1/05 - 11/30/06).
- Ximing Guo, David Bushek and Susan Ford. Mapping dermo-resistance
genes for marker-assisted selection in the eastern oyster. NOAA
Sea Grant ODRP, $124,909 (10/1/05 - 9/30/06).
- Yongping Wang, Ximing Guo, Gregory DeBrosse, David Bushek and
Susan Ford. Enhance growth and disease-resistance of the eastern
oyster by interstrain hybridization and triploidy. NOAA Sea Grant
ODRP, $125,227 (10/1/05 -9/30/06).
- J.R. Reinfelder, K.D. Bidle (IMCS), and A.J. Milligan (Oregon
State). Regulation of the C4-CCM in Marine Diatoms by CO2, Light
and Nutrients. NSF Biological Oceanography, $434,860 (8/15/05
- 8/14/08).
- David Bushek, Susan Ford and Ximing Guo. "A histological
investigation of oyster parasites and pathology in three Chinese
estuaries containing varying mixtures of coexisting oyster species,
including Crassostrea
ariakensis." NOAA, $84,705 (12/1/05 to 11/30/06).
- David Bushek, Ximing Guo, Greg DeBrosse and John Quinlan. "Fertilization
interference between C. ariakensis and C. virginica:
supplement for distance experiments." NOAA, $10,000 added
to $93,897 all ready awarded (12/1/04 - 11/30/06).
- N.P. Psuty. Shoreline Monitoring at Fire Island National Seashore.
National Park Service, $13,292 (7/1/05-12/31/08).
- D.B. Haidvogel. DDDAS - Collaborative Proposal: Multiscale Data-Driven
POD-Based Prediction of the Ocean. NSF, $25,000 (10/1/05-9/30/06).
- N.P. Psuty. Human Impacts on Geomorph Processes, Fire Island.
National Park Service, $7,990 (8/9/04-3/31/07).
- J. Levin. High-Order Multiscale Ocean Modeling on Adaptive Unstructured
Meshes: Comparison of SEOM and ROMS in the Northwest Atlantic.
University of Miami, $37,302 (3/1/05-9/30/05).
- S. Seitzinger. RCN: Dentrification-Integrating Landscapes and
Waterscapes (PGM: Cooperative Marine Education and Research).
NSF, $100,000 (8/1/05-7/31/06).
- Y. Rosenthal. Collaborative Research: Reconstructing Holocene
Climate Variability and the Indonesian throughflow in the Western
Equatorial Pacific. NSF, $160,946 (7/1/05-6/30/08).
- M.J. Kennish and S. Haag. Demographic Investigation of SAV in
Barnegat Bay (Prime: EPA National Estuary). Ocean County College
- Barnegat Bay NEP, $31,950 (6/1/05-5/31/06).
- D.B. Haidvogel. Development of a Multi-Scale, Coupled Climate
Modeling System for the Coastal Zone. Princeton University, $100,000
(7/1/05-6/30/05).
- S. Seitzinger. Eutrophication in the Baltic Seas. Swedish Environmental
Protection Agency, $15,000 (7/1/05-10/31/05).
- M.J. Kennish. Initial Evaluation of Nine Primary Indicators
for the Barnegat Bay NEP. Ocean County College-Barnegat Bay NEP,
$9,000 (10/1/04-9/30/05).
Publications
- Palmer, D.R., and Rona, P.A., 2005, Acoustical imaging of deep
ocean hydrothermal flows, in H. Medwin, Sounds in the Sea: From
Ocean Acoustics to Acoustical Oceanography, Cambridge University
Press, 643 p., p. 551-563.
- Deng, Y., X. Liu, G. Zhang and X. Guo. 2005. Inbreeding depression
and maternal effects on early performance of Pacific abalone.
North Ameri. J. Aquacult., 67:231-236.
- Hedgecock, D. P.M. Gaffney, P. Goulletquer, X. Guo, K. Reece
and G. Warr. 2005. A case for sequencing the Pacific oyster genome.
J. Shellfish Res., 24(2):429-441.
- Wang, Y., Z. Xu. J.C. Pierce and X. Guo. 2005. Characterization
of eastern oyster (Crassostrea virginica Gmelin) chromosomes
by fluorescence in situ hybridization with bacteriophage P1 clones.
Mar. Biotechnol., 7:207-214.
- Two of Alan Robock's websites have been been selected for inclusion
in the Digital Library for Earth System Education, at http://www.dlese.org.
The websites are: Volcanic Eruptions and Climate http://climate.envsci.rutgers.edu/VolcanicEruptionsClimate.html
and Nuclear Winter
http://climate.envsci.rutgers.edu/NuclearWinter.html
Student News
- Katye Altieri participated in the SOLAS (Surface Ocean Lower
Atmosphere) summer school program in Corisa, France, this past
August.
- Let's welcome our new Graduate Program in Oceanography students:
Eleni Anagnostou, "Honestly, anything biogeochemical in
the Mediterranean sounds like a dream project to me. However,
I’m more interested in trace metal biochemistry, paleoceanography,
nutrient cycling, and modeling." Eleni's advisor is Rob
Sherrell. (Tel. 2-6555 x257, room 211B)
Emily Clinch, "I think I'm interested in corals and paleoclimate,
though of course that's always always always subject to change."
Emily completed her undergraduate work at Williams and her current
advisor is Yair Rosenthal. (Tel. 2-6555 x372, room 114a)
Xiaofeng Zhang, "I was absolutely shocked by the beauty
when I first saw the ocean in my twenties. Then I believed,
it's interesting to work in biological oceanography. I'm glad
to have a chance to fulfill my dream at Rutgers, focusing on
shellfish ecology in the ocean." Xiaofeng received his
B.S. and M.S. from Nanjing University. His advisor is Dave Bushek.
(Tel. 2-6555 x372, room 114a)
Let's Welcome
The OBIS secretariat is pleased to announce the appointment of
Dr. Catherine N. Duckett as OBIS program manager. Most recently
she was an NSF Advance Fellow at the Smithsonian studying phylogenetics
and taxonomy of beetles using molecular and morphological techniques.
Previously she was an Associate Professor at the University of Puerto
Rico at Rio Piedras. Catherine is currently a subject editor for
the journal Zootaxa and recently co-organized a symposium on evolution
of beetles at the International Congress of Entomology. She has
published 22 peer-reviewed papers on beetle phylogeny, taxonomy
and ecology. She was a Fulbright scholar in Venezuela in 1990 and
a Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) Fellow in Toyama,
Japan in 1993. She is fluent in Spanish and conversant in Portuguese.
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