{"id":714,"date":"2026-01-26T18:56:42","date_gmt":"2026-01-27T01:56:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/wetvet\/?p=714"},"modified":"2026-01-26T19:02:19","modified_gmt":"2026-01-27T02:02:19","slug":"how-do-you-become-a-professional-aquarist-and-life-support-specialist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/wetvet\/2026\/01\/26\/how-do-you-become-a-professional-aquarist-and-life-support-specialist\/","title":{"rendered":"Trevor Erdmann on Life Support Systems: A Podcast for Aquarists"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>The INFLOW Podcast recently interviewed our own Trevor Erdmann &#8211; HMSC Senior Aquarist and Life Support\/Instrumentation  Specialist. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Trevor and I both started in the profession as teenagers but took slightly different paths. He is a recognized expert in the field of life support systems and water quality and an excellent teacher and mentor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A thorough understanding of life support systems and water quality is an  essential set of skills professional aquarists must have in order to ensure optimal aquatic animal health  and welfare.<br><br>So, If you are interested in aquatic animal care this podcast provides a great discussion of the profession and the skills required to be successful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Trevor discusses the professional certification schemes through the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aalso.org\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/www.aalso.org\">Association of Aquatic Life Support system Operators (AALSO)<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><br>Here&#8217;s the link to the <a href=\"https:\/\/inflowlsspodcast.com\/episode\/ep-34-aquarists-as-life-support-operators-education-certification-and-the-future-of-lss-with-trevor-erdman\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/inflowlsspodcast.com\/episode\/ep-34-aquarists-as-life-support-operators-education-certification-and-the-future-of-lss-with-trevor-erdman\">INFLOW podcast<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Enjoy<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Dr. Tim<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The INFLOW Podcast recently interviewed our own Trevor Erdmann &#8211; HMSC Senior Aquarist and Life Support\/Instrumentation Specialist. Trevor and I both started in the profession as teenagers but took slightly different paths. He is a recognized expert in the field of life support systems and water quality and an excellent teacher and mentor. A thorough &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/wetvet\/2026\/01\/26\/how-do-you-become-a-professional-aquarist-and-life-support-specialist\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Trevor Erdmann on Life Support Systems: A Podcast for Aquarists<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":256,"featured_media":719,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[279,499,1341,281,285,286,1342,289,6495,1,296,298],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-714","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-animal-husbandry","category-aquaculture","category-aquarium-science","category-aquatic-veterinary-medicine","category-educational-opportunities","category-fish-health-management","category-husbandry-training","category-industry-profiles","category-life-support-systems","category-uncategorized","category-views-of-the-industry","category-water-quality"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/osu-wams-blogs-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs.dir\/179\/files\/2026\/01\/create-a-featured-image-that-captures-a-complex-aquarium-life.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p64BkM-bw","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/wetvet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/714","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/wetvet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/wetvet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/wetvet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/256"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/wetvet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=714"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/wetvet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/714\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":720,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/wetvet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/714\/revisions\/720"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/wetvet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/wetvet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=714"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/wetvet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=714"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/wetvet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=714"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}