Division of Ocean Sciences - Fall 2000 Newsletter

Program News

Biological Oceanography / Chemical Oceanography / Marine Geology and Geophysics / Ocean Drilling Program / Oceanographic Technology and Interdisciplinary Coordination Program (OTIC) / Physical Oceanography / Education

Biological Oceanography

Personnel News

Dr. Kendra Daly is coming to the end of her tenure as Visiting Scientist and Associate Program Director for Biological Oceanography. She will leave the NSF in February 2001 to take up a faculty position at the University of South Florida’s (USF) College of Marine Science - St. Petersburg. Kendra has been a fantastic colleague here in OCE, serving the NSF and the community in many capacities with major contributions to U.S. GLOBEC and U.S. JGOFS. She roped some of us into holiday-time singing careers, a la Handel, and brought levity to BioOCE events. USF is lucky indeed.

We are currently looking for a replacement for Dr. Daly as Visiting Scientist and Assistant/Associate Program Director for Biological Oceanography. See the job announcement posted at https://www.nsf.gov/home/chart/work.htm. We are open to scientists with a variety of expertise in the field of biological oceanography / marine ecology; we are particularly interested in scientists with good experience in microbial ecology and the U.S. academic science enterprise. No singing credentials are needed.

Alison Sipe, our former Sea Grant Fellow and Science Assistant in the Biological Oceanography and Oceanographic Technology and Interdisciplinary Coordination Programs, has left for greener pastures. She has been mountain-biking the “slick rock” terrain of Utah for a brief breather on her way to pursuing interests in molecular biosciences. Alison provided much to the Division during her year-and-a-half tenure (e.g., in Biocomplexity, LExEn, Field Stations and Marine Labs, Genomics, and other areas) and was an absolutely wonderful person to work with. We will miss her and hope that she is not lost to the ocean sciences community.

Update on GLOBEC

In cooperation with NOAA, NSF/OCE/Biological Oceanography is supporting the U.S. GLOBEC Northeast Pacific Program in the Coastal Gulf of Alaska. This will complement the California Current System part of the Northeast Pacific Program that was initiated a year ago. The NSF will support 10 of the 14 awards made in support of these programs in 2000. More information on the U.S. GLOBEC Northeast Pacific Program is available at http://globec.oce.orst.edu/groups/nep/.

U.S. GLOBEC Northwest Atlantic/Georges Bank Program: The Biological Oceanography Program, on behalf of the Division of Ocean Sciences, and in cooperation with NOAA Coastal Oceans Program, intends to initiate Integration and Synthesis of the U.S. GLOBEC Northwest Atlantic/Georges Bank Program Studies: The impact of oceanographic and climate-related processes on the dynamics of plankton and fish populations. This will be the fourth and final phase of the U.S. GLOBEC Northwest Atlantic Program. Its principal objective is to foster integration and synthesis of data collected during the field phases of the program, and other relevant data and knowledge, through group interactions and modeling activities. No new fieldwork will be supported.

The Phase IV initiative is absolutely open to the participation of scientists without past involvement in U.S. GLOBEC as well as past and present U.S. GLOBEC investigators. The organization of principal investigators and proposals with emphasis on the integration of observations and models, and the close coordination of research groups with one another, will be vital to the success of the Phase IV synthesis effort. Look for the announcement to be released from NSF and NOAA this fall.

Update on Biocomplexity

The second round of the Biocomplexity (Phase II) competition was concluded in June of this year. As was the case for the first year of the competition, ocean science investigators were well represented among the awards. About 300 research proposals and about 170 incubation activity proposals were submitted. Five ocean science-related projects were awarded a total of $16.4 M of ~ $45 M for the overall competition (16 awards total). Three projects will be managed by the OCE Biological Oceanography Program, one by the Office of Polar Programs, Arctic Natural Sciences Program, and another by the Directorate for Biological Sciences, Ecology Program. In addition to these large interdisciplinary projects, six smaller awards (around $100,000 each) for “Incubation Activities” were awarded for OCE-related planning activities to develop future Biocomplexity proposals.

Biocomplexity research awards (listed by the lead investigators below, along with the subject and other institutions involved):

  • Alan Hastings et al. (U.C. Davis, Scripps, S.F. Estuary Inst.) on: An invasive marsh grass, interactions with sediment geophysics,water flows, and other plants species; changes in invertebrate communities and bird foraging; influences on the environmental value to humans;influences on the ability of the system to facilitate further invasive species. San Francisco Bay.

  • Mark Bain et al (Cornell Univ.) on: Interactions of hydrodynamics, embayment characteristics, watershed, water quality and ecosystem properties in Lake Ontario.

  • Jesus Pineda et al (WHOI, UNC, Cent. Connecticut, CICESE - Mexico) on: Internal waves, long and cross shelf transport, life historydynamics and behavior in the determination of benthic population dynamics. San Diego/Northern Baja California.

  • Peter Verity et al (Skidaway, Gerogia Tech) on: Physicalbiological-geochemical coupling in the alternate states of a marine phytoplankton dominated system: Phaeocystis and complex system adaptation, Norwegian Sea.

  • Falkowski et al (Rutgers, and many others) on: The adaptive radiation/evolution in the ocean’s primary producers.

Biocomplexity incubation awards (listed with lead investigator and title):

  • Craig Cary, U. Delaware, Origins of Biocomplexity: Colonization and Succession of Microbial Communities in a Dynamic Geochemical Environment

  • Robert DeSalle, American Museum of Natural History, Development of an integrated research plan for analyzing the viability of a marine reserve network

  • David Eggleston, North Carolina State Univ., Interactions between Life and Environment in the Coastal Zone, North Carolina

  • Joel Morrison, Ohio State Univ., Biocomplexity of Lake Erie

  • Kenneth Tenore (for Roberta Marinelli), U. Maryland, Multiscale models of ecological and geochemical interactions in marine sedimentary environments

  • Pedro Verdugo, U. Washington, The colloid gap: interfacial phenomena among marine biological, chemical and physical environmental systems and their role in carbon cycling

More details on these awards, including abstracts, can be found at https://www.nsf.gov/home/crssprgm/be/.

LExEn 2000-2001 Results

Bio OCE served as the “lead” for the participation of OCE in LExEn this year. The competition has been finalized with 25 awards coming from both 2000 and 2001 funding. The award list can be accessed at https://www.nsf.gov/home/crssprgm/lexen/start.htm. Seven awarded projects involve OCE.

Census of Marine Life

As part of National Oceanographic Partnership Program (NOPP) activities, the Biological Oceanography Program participated in the review of proposals to develop the Ocean Biogeographic Information System (OBIS) (see: http://core.cast.msstate.edu/NOPP00BAA.html#topicb). Nineteen proposals were received for OBIS activities and eight were recommended for awards (see: http://core.cast.msstate.edu/censobis1.html). Three proposals will be managed by the Biological Oceanography Program. Funding within NSF for this activity was provided by OCE/OTIC Program and by the Systematics Program and DATABASE within the Directorate of Biological Sciences (BIO).

The need for a focus on “species” and to develop biological data bases using “state of the art” technology was highlighted as a cross cutting issue in the OEUVRE (Ocean Ecology: Understanding and Vision for REsearch) report. OBIS activities are a modest beginning to address this issue.

Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU)

REU Supplements - deadline to Program 1 February 2001: Bio OCE is encouraging PIs to propose ways in which they and other collaborating scientists supported by OCE might use a number of undergraduates in a sort of research consortium arrangement. We are interested in arrangements that provide experience with interdisciplinary research in a community setting of PIs, graduate students, post-docs and technicians. In addition, the setting should provide students with diverse re-search experiences. Consortial arrangements might include mentorship by a number of PIs at a single institution. Alternatively, a consortium might occur in a field operation implemented by PIs/mentors from different institutions. We are looking for creative plans for the use of REU supplements that would not fit well in the context of REU sites, but do more to show undergraduate students the diversity and dynamics of inter-disciplinary research in the ocean sciences.

Phil Taylor (prtaylor@nsf.gov)
Dave Garrison (dgarrison@nsf.gov)
Kendra Daly (kdaly@nsf.gov)
Cynthia Suchman (csuchman@nsf.gov)
Natasha Gray (ngray@nsf.gov)