Autumn issue of Confluence explores ocean science learning

Free-choice learning and ocean literacy are the theme of the autumn issue of Confluence, the three-times-a-year magazine from Oregon Sea Grant.

The issue includes articles on exciting research taking place at the Hatfield Marine Science Center to investigate how people learn in aquariums, museums and other places when the choice of what, when and how quickly to learn is under their control. Additional stories look at OSU’s academic programs in free-choice learning, including a new online master’s degree in free-choice science, technology, engineering and math (STEM learning),   Lincoln County’s efforts to make its public school teachers and students among the most ocean-literate in the country, and our Oregon Coast QUESTS self-guided adventures.

The autumn issue rounds out the magazine’s first year, and includes an online survey asking readers to let us know how they use the publication, how they prefer to receive it, and what ocean and coastal topics interest them most.

The online version of Confluence includes a number of extras, including additional articles, video from the Free-Choice Learning Lab, and an interview with Sea Grant Knauss Fellow Jennifer Dresler about her year working  in Washington, D.C.

Learn more

 

New marine mammal position open

Oregon Sea Grant and the Oregon State University Marine Mammal Institute are jointly seeking to fill a new, full-time assistant- or associate-level professorship in marine mammal behavioral ecology.

The new faculty member will be based at OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport, and will also serve as Sea Grant Extension marine mammal specialist. Duties include a combination of research, teaching and public outreach.

This is a fulltime, tenure-track position, with tenure offered at .50 FTE. A PhD. is required. Rank will depend on qualifications.

The selected candidate will be expected to conduct original research and provide statewide, national and international expertise on marine mammals with an emphasis on cetacean ecology. He or she will conduct programs on appropriate basic science, conservation, wildlife management and natural resources issues, and will be expected to raise funds for annual research objectives and to help build the OSU marine mammal endowment.

The full position description and application is available on the OSU Jobs site. For full consideration, applications must be submitted by Dec. 15, 2012.

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Traces of Fukushima radiation found in Pacific albacore

Researcher Delvan Neville labels containers of albacore tuna samplesCORVALLIS, Ore. – Samples of albacore tuna caught off the West Coast of the United States show minute traces of radiation that can be traced to the Fukushima reactor disaster, according to an interdisciplinary team of scientists from Oregon State University and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The radiation levels in fish analyzed to date are far below anything that would pose a risk to humans who consume the fish, the research team emphasized. The findings are preliminary; additional fish remain to be tested.

But the findings could reveal new information about where Pacific albacore travel during their migratory lives – and how what happens in one part of the ocean can affect the food web thousands of miles away.

The team has collected and tested fish caught off the U.S. West Coast both before and after the devastating March 2011 Japanese tsunami and subsequent release of radioactive material into the ocean by the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactor.

“We’re still processing new fish, but so far the radiation we’re detecting is far below the level of   concern for human safety,” said Delvan Neville, a graduate researcher with OSU’s Radiation Health Physics program and a co-investigator on the project.

People are constantly exposed to radiation from the natural environment, Neville pointed out. “To increase their normal annual dosage of radiation by just 1 percent, a person would have to eat more than 4,000 pounds of the highest (radiation) level albacore we’ve seen.”

Neville will present the team’s preliminary findings on Oct. 27 at the Heceta Head Coastal Conference in Florence. Richard Brodeur, the NOAA Northwest Fisheries Science Center biologist who serves as lead investigator on the project, reported the same findings to the recent annual meeting of  PICES, the North Pacific Marine Science Organization, in Japan. The researchers also plan scientific journal articles.

Read the complete story from OSU News & Research Information

Sea-level information workshops planned for south, north coast

A pair of workshops on sea-level hazards are coming up Oct. 24 and 29 on Oregon’s south and north coast to help local emergency managers, planners and the interested public learn more about sea-level risks and what can be done about them.

Sea-level rise, storm surges and tsunamis will all be covered in the two workshops, organized by Oregon Sea Grant and the Oregon Coastal Management program. The purposes is to explore how learning more about the natural hazards posed by sea levels might affect local communities and their decisions: What science tells us, how that information can be used, how communities might respond and what  tools and resources they need.

The first workshop takes place from 1-4 pm Oct. 24 at the Red Lion Hotel, 1313 N. Bayshore Drive, Coos Bay. The second will be held at the same time Oct. 29, at Tillamook Bay Community College rooms 2140215, 4301 Third St., Tillamook.

Both meetings will include presentations on:

  • The science behind global and level sea level rise (Phil Mote, Oregon Climate Change Research Institute)
  • Ocean, atmospheric and tectonic influences on sea levels (Jonathan Allan, Oregon Department of Geology and Mineral Industries
  • The effects of changing sea levels on estuaries and wetlands (speaker TBD).

After a question-and-answer session on the science of sea level hazards, a panel of local elected officials, planners, public works and emergency managers will informally discuss how this information can be used in their day-to-day work, what community resources are at risks and what decisions they are making that could be affected by the information.

Both meetings are free and open to the public. For more information, contact either of the workshop coordinators: Oregon Sea Grant’s coastal hazards specialist, Patrick Corcoran, or Jeff Weber, Oregon Coastal Zone Management Program.

Public forum aims to demystify ocean acidification, hypoxia

How is Oregon's ocean affected by hypoxia and acidification?TILLAMOOK – Hypoxia and ocean acidification get a lot of press, but how many people know what these phenomena are, what causes them and what they mean for marine species and coastal communities? Now’s the chance to find out, in an Oct. 23 public forum that aims to take some of the mystery out of the science behind measuring, understanding and minimizing the effects of of these ocean conditions.

The forum, starting at 6:30 pm in rooms 214-215 at Tillamook Bay Community College, 4301 3rd St., is free and open to the public. Pre-registration is encouraged, but not required. For more information, visit the PISCO Website.

Organized by the Partnership for Interdisciplinary Studies of the Ocean (PISCO) and Oregon Sea Grant, the forum will focus on cutting edge research by scientists from many disciplines, and how resource managers and industries are responding.  A series of speakers will address:

  • The definitions of ocean acidification and coastal hypoxia, and how they are related – Francis Chan, OSU Zoology/PISCO
  • Why this is happening off our coast and what makes Oregon vulnerable – Burke Hales, OSU College of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences (CEOAS).
  • How scientists are monitoring the ocean for these changes – Jack Barth (CEOAS/PISCO)
  • The impacts of acidification on shellfish hatcheries – Alan Barton (Whiskey Creek Shellfish Hatchery)

Speakers will be followed by a question-and-answer panel featuring scientists and representatives of the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The event is hosted by PISCO through funding from Oregon Sea Grant.

Request for proposals: ocean contaminants, marine debris

Oregon Sea Grant is soliciting research proposals for one-year grants on two topics of high priority to Oregon’s ocean and coast: Water contaminants, and tsunami-related marine debris. The submission deadline is 5 pm Nov. 5, 2012.

Sea Grant  and its citizen advisory council have identified contaminants in Oregon waters – both ocean and freshwater – as an important research issue for the state. The recent and anticipated arrival of marine debris from the March 2011 Japanese tsunami also raises timely research and public engagement questions. As a result, Sea Grant has set aside funding for between one and  four single-year grant proposals addressing either of these issues. The total available funding is $80,000.

This special funding call seeks proposals that apply the best science and an innovative approach to address either: 1) a well-defined coastal or watershed research question addressing contaminants, or 2) research related to tsunami marine debris.

All Oregon Sea Grant research grants must include public outreach and engagement components.

For more information, visit our Website.

HMSC volunteers return to sea – and blogging

Michael Courtney and Annie Thorp aboard the RV Wecoma, 2011NEWPORT – Michael Courtney and Annie Thorp, longtime volunteers at Oregon State University’s Hatfield Marine Science Center, return to sea this week as support crew for Dr. Clare Reimers, an ocean ecologist and biogeochemist with OSU’s Colleage of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, who is studying the role of seafloor processes in ocean chemical cycles, the influences of low oxygen conditions on ocean biology, geology and chemistry, and new electrochemical tools for ocean observing networks.

Courtney and Thorp, who are husband and wife, have been volunteering at the HMSC Visitor Center since their retirement and have offered their services to shipboard research teams since 2009. They plan to once again chronicle their adventures in words and photographs through their blog, Buoy Tales.

As they wrote at the end of last year’s cruise with Dr. Reimers’ team, “Science is not just sitting in a warm, stable lab. It is also hard, hard work. Collecting the necessary data means being cold, wet, getting dirty, laying on a rough, rolling deck adjusting sensitive equipment, taking samples in an enclosed van under a dim red light, and working in a lab that won’t stand still.”

This voyage will be on board the R/V Oceanus, OSU’s new research vessel. The research team is loading and setting up equipment today, and expects to depart tomorrow for a cruise lasting until Oct. 15, taking the science team to the waters of the the continental shelf off the Pacific Northwest coast.

Learn more:

OSG’s Cone to speak at Marylhurst climate forum

Joe ConePORTLAND – Joe Cone, Oregon Sea Grant’s assistant director and a veteran science writer and videographer, will speak on the science of communicating with the public about climate change at this Saturday’s Climate Change Forum at Marylhurst University.

Cone, who leads the OSG communications team, has been a principal investigator on multiple NOAA-funded research projects with partners in Oregon and across the country, studying how sound information, when grounded in research understanding of the views and concerns of local residents, can help coastal communities  prepare for the changes that will come with climate variability. In addition, he has produced a number of publications aimed at applying social science insights and principles to science communication.

Those projects have resulted in two videos, based on surveys of public knowledge and opinion, addressing questions residents of Oregon and Maine have about the changing climate. Cone has also produced a podcast, Communicating Climate Change, featuring audio and video interviews with leading social scientists on the subject.

His talk, scheduled for 2 pm Saturday, will address “Communication About Climate Change: Research and Practical Experience.” Cone is one of several speakers from OSU.

Learn more:

 

Sea Grant’s Mark Whitham on home-canning albacore tuna

Mark Whitham, Oregon Sea Grant’s Extension seafood product development specialist, was featured recently on Portland TV station KATU’s AM Northwest program‘s Edible Portland feature in this video about how to home can albacore tuna, one of the Pacific Northwest’s tastiest, most healthful and sustainably harvested fish:

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2012 Oregon Sea Grant Scholars Day Symposium

Oregon Sea Grant will hold its inaugural Scholars Day Symposium on October 8th, 2012 in the Memorial Union Joyce Powell Leadership Center Journey Room.  The Symposium starts at noon and ends at 5:00.

The agenda and the program abstracts can be downloaded on our Scholars Day website.

Join us for all or part of the afternoon. Thy symposium will feature presentations and posters by some of the brightest young scholars supported by Oregon Sea Grant’s fellowship, scholarship, internship, and research programs.

Besides showcasing undergraduate and graduate student projects and achievements, this interdepartmental, inter-institutional event is an opportunity for dialogue among researchers, decision makers, industry leaders, and the academic community about Oregon’s current ocean and coastal issues.

The Sea Grant Scholars program is intended to recognize and enhance long-term benefits to students who receive academic and research support from Oregon Sea Grant. The goal is to create a community of scholars, help them identify with the program and its mission, and foster professional development, research and outreach within coastal and ocean sciences in the state.

Why attend?

  • Learn more about Oregon Sea Grant and its student programs
  • Interact with Oregon Sea Grant personnel and the university community
  • Talk with researchers, decision makers, industry leaders, stakeholders, and students about Oregon’s current ocean issues

Questions: seagrant.admin@oregonstate.edu