Congratulations to RUCOOL graduate student Emily Slesinger who just published the second paper from her thesis, co-authored with Rutgers Faculty Grace Saba and Olaf Jensen. The paper is titled “Spawning phenology of rapidly shifting marine fish species throughout its range”. The abstract is below and the full paper is available at the ICES Journal of Marine Science. Abstract: Ocean warming is leading to poleward range shifts for many fish species, and while well described, potential life history phenology differences within fish populations along a gradient from their historic to current distributional range have not been studied. In a rapidly shifting fish population, the Northern stock of black sea bass (Centropristis striata), we investigated spawning phenology and output across the US Northeast Shelf to comprise locations in their historic and more recently occupied range near their northern range boundary. Spawning started later in the northern extreme of our study but also ended earlier, leading to decreased spawning duration from south to north. Spawning phenology was mostly driven by Julian day followed by temperature and latitude. Gonadosomatic index, a proxy for reproductive output, was lower in the northern region, indicating that black sea bass did not compensate for the shorter spawning season there. Hepatosomatic index was lower in the northern regions indicating lower pre-spawning liver energy reserves, potentially leading to lower reproductive output. These results suggest a potential for lower recruitment in the recently occupied range and should be further investigated to predict the impacts of ocean warming and for proactive fisheries management as black sea bass distributional range expands poleward.

Douglas C. Webb, founder of Teledyne Webb Research, has been appointed as Oceanographer Emeritus at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, effective January 1, 2021. This peer appointed honorary position has been bestowed upon Doug Webb in recognition of his contributions to WHOI and to oceanographic science and engineering world-over. Doug has been a partner with RUCOOL for almost a quarter of a century. His Slocum gliders have enabled research across the globe, and at Rutgers, are used to study hurricane intensities, sediment transport during storms, ocean acidification, coastal water quality, locations of plankton and fish in the water column around Antarctica, and most recently in tracking whales along the NJ Coast. Perhaps Doug’s most important gift is his ability to instill passion about science into the future generations. “I continue to have the good fortune of working alongside Doug through many shared adventures. Doug’s spark of inquisitiveness and creativity is contagious, and we strive to follow the advice that he gave to Rutgers students after the first Slocum glider Atlantic Ocean crossing – ‘Work hard, have fun, and change the world’,” said Clayton Jones, Senior Director of Technology, Teledyne Marine. For the complete article, click here.

Faculty, Scott Glenn, Oscar Schofield, and Travis Miles with The Rutgers University Center for Ocean Observing Leadership (RUCOOL), were recently awarded a $150,000 gift from the G. Unger Vetlesen Foundation for the continuing support of the global Challenger Glider Mission. The gift will support oceanographic research, capacity building, and education with autonomous underwater gliders in the Caribbean. It will include international glider deployments to study ocean heat transport from the tropical Atlantic into the Caribbean Sea, and will sample the ocean underneath hurricanes that transit through the region. This project is in partnership with the non-profit Ocean and Coastal Observing – Virgin Islands, the University of the Virgin Islands, among other institutions throughout the Caribbean, and will serve as a U.S. contribution to the U.N. Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development.

This August, RUCOOL will host a week-long, hands-on experience using underwater glider technologies. Participants will be introduced to the underwater robots while gaining hands on experience prepping, ballasting, deploying and piloting. This is an exciting opportunity for undergraduate students with little to no experience using this equipment as part of their courses or laboratories. The Marine Technology Glider Camp is designed to offer students a chance to not only learn about underwater gliders, but also deploy the equipment to gather data applied to various investigations. For more information or to apply, go to our Glider Technology Camp page.

Assistant Professor Grace Saba was one of several collaborative experts that published this comprehensive assessment of the status quo and future of Antarctica and the Southern Ocean that surrounds it. See the press release from Alfred Wegener Institute (here) and the paper now published in Biological Reviews: https://doi.org/10.1111/brv.12679. The decade from 2010 to 2020 has been by far the most successful in gaining evidence-based knowledge on ecological processes in the Antarctic. This applies to novel as well as traditional topics. Of particular interest are the reactions of life to climate change and their contributions to global carbon budgets. Equally relevant are evolutionary adaptations to the extremely polar conditions, which under climate change determines the survival or extinction of species. 25 experts met in Coimbra (Portugal) in 2019, synthesized hundreds of individual results from the past ten years and publish now 10 main and 31 detailed messages. In summary, it must be stated that the ecosystems on land and in the ocean are under specific environmental stress and are subject to change in various forms and intensity. And this takes place in ecosystems that are either geographically isolated from the rest of the world and, thus, globally unique, or, alternatively, are more closely linked to adjacent habitats than previously thought. Both are good reasons why in all assessments of global biodiversity and biogeochemical cycles such results from the Antarctic must be considered. The results show how life in the Antarctic responds differently, but also similarly, to environmental changes, in particular climate-induced warming and ice melting. This refers to species, communities and ecosystems on land, in lakes, under the inland, shelf and sea ice and in the open ocean. Particular challenges are long-term and large-scale observations that can contribute to a comprehensive understanding of the response of key ecological species and processes to climate change, ocean acidification and pollution. They are especially important in a time when climate change seems to affect the entire Antarctic, including areas that have been quite environmentally stable so far.

Research Internships in Ocean Sciences (RIOS) is an undergraduate research program that will introduce you to an active and collaborative ocean research environment. With support from the National Science Foundation, you will conduct ocean research over a paid, 10-week summer internship offered by the Department of Marine and Coastal Sciences at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey. Continuing undergraduate students pursuing majors in environmental sciences, engineering, geology, biology, physics, or mathematics are encouraged to apply. The program will run 10 weeks, from June 1 to August 6, 2021. Applications and supporting materials are due on February 7, 2021. For more information, visit our RIOS Application Page.

It’s not every week that two students on your team complete a grad student thesis defense, but that’s what happened this week at RUCOOL. On December 14, Sarah Murphy presented her Master’s Thesis defense entitled “Coastal Upwelling and the Offshore Wind Environment”. On December 16th, Cliff Watkins wrapped up his PhD. with his dissertation presentation on “Mixed Layer Dynamics: Exploring the Impact of Storms in the Mid Atlantic Bight.” We congratulate both Sarah and Cliff on a job virtually well done. Good luck to you in your new jobs in 2021!