News

MLML Students Win National Geographic Competition

Mina Sattari

Blogging their way to an ROV

Moss Landing Marine Lab's very own Miya Pavlock-McAuliffe and Marcel Peliks entered a contest with National Geographic's Open Explorers S.E.E Initiative and they won a remotely operated vehicle from Open ROV. Over the past few months they've been blogging about their mission to discover the shallow areas of the Monterey Submarine Canyon via multibeam sonar and scientific instrumentation to learn about the geologic processes that shape the Monterey Bay and understand how the features themselves influence the vibrant Monterey Bay ecosystem. The blog takes you on the journey of two scientists going through trial and error to seek new information.

Several researchers at MLML will have the opportunity to use this ROV for their studies. These two Geological Oceanographers aim to study massive submarine landslides, or mass gravity flows, that periodically occur at the edges of the canyon and have been shown to move sand, mud, and rocks miles into the deep. We aren't sure why they happen as they aren't linked to earthquakes or storms. They plan to use the ROV to survey the head of the canyon frequently, in order to observe if the timing of mass gravity flows in the canyon are connected to the longshore sediment transport system: do build ups in sediment moved from the beach to offshore cause these flows?

Of course these students owe a huge thank you Ivano Aiello for support throughout this process and to QPS for donating the software to process their preliminary multibeam data, without which none of this would've been possible.

MLML Research Faculty named Subject Editor of Harmful Algae

Mina Sattari

MLML's Holly Bowers named Subject Editor for the scientific journal Harmful Algae

Dr. Holly Bowers, a Research Faculty member at MLML, is now one of the Subject Editors for the scientific journal Harmful Algae. Holly is currently working on harmful algal blooms in coastal California in collaboration with Jason Smith at MLML, collaborators at MBARI and UCSC, and elsewhere.

Holly is excited to join the Editorial Board of Harmful Algae as a Subject Editor. This is her 20th year studying HABs (Harmful Algal Blooms) so she considers it an honor to be part of the third highest ranking publication among more than 100 marine and freshwater biology journals. She recently returned from the International Conference on HAB’s held in Nantes, France where she presented her work: “Diversity and toxicity of Pseudo-nitzschia species in Monterey Bay: Perspectives from targeted and adaptive sampling”. After the meeting, she thoroughly enjoyed exploring the Brittany region with no plans and no reservations!

MLML’s Holly Bowers is Using Exciting New Technology

Mina Sattari

MLML Researcher Holly Bowers is Using Exciting New Technology!

GenomeWeb recently published an article about Ubiquitome's newest portable qPCR platform.  Ubiquitome is commercializing a 16-well real-time PCR instrument that is aimed at personalizing the method and making it more accessible to researchers. Their new Liberty16 instrument is designed to be easily used in the field. MLML Research Faculty Holly Bowers recently won USC Sea Grant funding from the Ocean Protection Council Proposition 84 to study toxic algae using the Liberty16.

"Bowers' new funding will allow her group to take the Liberty16 into the field, and do PCR 'boatside, or shoreside,' she said, to detect different algae species in the water and to support local stakeholders. Boatside, and even 'tankside' research is much like bedside genomics, in which a clinician runs a test right next to a patient, she said. 'This takes us, as algal scientists, into that realm of thinking.' "

To read more about how researchers are using this new technology you can read the full article here.

MLML Research Faculty Receive Competitive OPC Grants

Kimberly Elson

Two MLML researchers have received grants from the California Ocean Protection Council (OPC) through the Proposition 84 Competitive Grants Program.

The research projects were selected through a competitive process based on criteria developed by OPC in alignment with its mission and priorities. California Sea Grant and the University of Southern California Sea Grant facilitated the review panel process and will administer project grants on behalf of OPC.

Read about Research Faculty Dr. Holly Bowers's project:

Advancing Portable Detection Capabilities of HAB Species in California Waters

 

Read about Research Faculty Dr. Luke Gardner's project:

Sea Feeds: Identification and culture of Californian marine macroalgae capable of reducing greenhouse gas production from ruminant livestock

MLML Affiliates take part in the Salish Sea Survey Expedition

Kimberly Elson

MLML affiliates, Dr. Gary Greene, a former director, and Joseph Bizzarro, an alumnus and current Adjunct Faculty, along with a colleague from University of Washington's Friday Harbor Laboratories, learn more about the sand lance, a fish who uses waves to move along the seafloor as part of the Salish Sea Expedition.

Read GeekWire's article on the Expedition here: Scientists in a sub turn up good news during expedition in the Salish Sea

MLML Graduate Student Amanda Camarato Returns from the Arctic!

Kimberly Elson

MLML student Amanda Camarato from the Physical Oceanography Lab  just spent over four weeks aboard the USCGC Healy, operating in the Beaufort Sea, deploying instruments to study Stratified Ocean Dynamics of the Arctic (SODA).  She was a part of the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) Team led by NPS meteorologist and MLML Adjunct Faculty member, Dr. Tim Stanton sent to deploy Autonomous Ocean Flux Buoys (AOFBs) on ice floes.