Researchers continue to advance hurricane science, leading to increased forecast accuracy and lead times As Superstorm Sandy approached the New Jersey coastline, a single Rutgers glider deployed off Tuckerton by hurricane scientists at Rutgers University Center for Ocean Observing Leadership, provided an ominous warning. The water mass known as the “Mid Atlantic cold pool”– an area of cool water off the coast that traditionally makes hurricanes less severe the further north they travel — mysteriously vanished from the New Jersey coast, eliminating one of state’s natural defenses against hurricanes. What followed was the second costliest tropical cyclone to impact the United States, which resulted in numerous lives lost because of Sandy’s high winds and catastrophic storm surges. The storm caused about $30 billion dollars’ worth of damage throughout New Jersey. Four days before Sandy made landfall, Travis Miles, then a doctoral degree student and now assistant professor of marine and coastal sciences, traveled 13 miles off the coast in rough seas to launch Glider RU23 – an ocean robot that can acquire data in the waves at the center of a hurricane and studies tropical storm intensification and ocean acidification, water temperature, depth, salinity and more – near the Rutgers University Marine Field Station. It was one of the first planned missions of its kind. Over the past decade, Rutgers robot research has helped change the field of oceanography and the way scientists understand extreme weather. In the last two weeks, gliders have been collecting information about Hurricane Ian off the coast of New Jersey as the storm traveled north after devastating parts of Florida. “As we watched Superstorm Sandy in 2012, it became more apparent it wasn’t weakening, at least not due to the ocean, the way Hurricane Irene did,” said Miles, a former graduate student of RU COOL cofounder Scott Glenn, who has been an integral part in developing a new generation of oceanographers. “All of the cold water we expected, similar to the year before, to weaken the storm wasn’t there. So we knew we had to track it.” Full article at Rutgers News

Downloads Full CV Research Interests My research interests dwell on historical water quality analytics, remote sensing applications, and geospatial referencing. In my profession, I aim to utilize my technical abilities to convey complex information relating to the condition of aquatic environments to a wide range of audiences. In the future, I aspire to contribute what I can to the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration National Ocean Service.   Short History I was raised within the piedmont area of North Carolina where my neighborhood’s encouragement of local gardening, reuse of resources, and encouragement of permaculture helped to instill an early appreciation for my present environment. In my younger years, my voracious hunger for knowledge led me to read encyclopedias from the local public library which led to an early assertion that studying the ocean was my reason for being. Unfortunately, due to persistent environmental disputes within my community such as land use and the increasing involvement of the environmental protection agency within the state, I became aware of the politics within environmental sciences early on. As I pursued higher education within the University of Maryland Eastern Shore, I was able to apply a much greater focus to my efforts in marine studies through the lens of environmental policy.

The Long-Term Ecological Research site at Palmer Station, Antarctica, celebrates its 30th field season this year. Thanks to this long-running research program, scientists have consistently tracked environmental changes taking place along the Antarctic Peninsula, one of the fastest-warming regions on Earth, over the past several decades. Researchers have also seen how those changes have rippled through the food web, affecting everything from microscopic ocean plants and tiny crustaceans to penguins and other seabirds and marine mammals. Data collected from the Palmer LTER helps researchers understand not only how climate change is disturbing the marine ecosystem of the Antarctic Peninsula, but also gives them an idea of what the coldest places on Earth might look like in the coming decades. “I think the LTER is going to help guide us in understanding where the polar regions of this planet are going to go,” said Oscar Schofield, an oceanographer at Rutgers University and lead Principal Investigator of the Palmer LTER. “If you didn’t have this long-term dataset, you’re not in a position to understand why the ecology changes.” Full article at The Antarctic Sun

Rutgers has been participating in the National Science Foundation’s Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) project at Palmer Station Antarctica for over 30 years. During the fall of 2021, graduate students Quintin Diou-Cass and Joe Gradone joined UConn Postdoc Jessie Turner on the R/V Nathaniel Palmer to head to the West Antarctic Peninsula. Over the next few weeks, we are going to write up accounts of their experiences during their research way, way down under. Here is account of some glider recovery fun. Two gliders were deployed to study both the zooplankton distribution on the West Antarctic Peninsula as well as a hydrographic fronts in the South Bransfield Strait. These autonomous underwater vehicles make researchers’ lives easier at times by collecting data in harsh conditions where ships cannot travel. As anyone who has worked with a glider for just a few days can tell you, however, these cool instruments can be very fussy too. My job (Joe) on the cruise was to keep the two gliders we deployed as happy as possible while also continuing my work helping the Schofield phytoplankton lab. The cherry on top of an already eventful glider deployment was trying to recover both gliders in what was forecasted to be 50 knot winds and 10-20 foot seas. While a large research vessel would be able to sustain these conditions without issue, we needed to put zodiac’s in the water to recover these gliders. So, when we saw the forecast, we devised a plan to fly the gliders into the very northern edge of a channel in an attempt to essentially hide behind an island and seek shelter from the winds so that we could put a small boat in the water. Miraculously, this plan worked! The seas were significantly better behind the island and we were actually able to swim the glider almost right up to the ship. Definitely a memorable recovery.

The Rutgers Master’s of Operational Oceanography program offers a comprehensive education in operational oceanography, emphasizing applied experiences and cutting-edge technology, with a focus on numerical forecast models, data synthesis/analysis, and real-time ocean observing teams, preparing graduates for careers in research and industry to contribute to the sustainable growth of the Blue Economy. Alex López speaks at OTEAR Classroom Inclusivity Workshop MS of Operational Oceanography students deploy Sofar Spotter buoy Masters of Operational Oceanography students deployed RU23 out of Tuckerton MOO Students Learn About Operational Platforms at Ocean Power Technologies (OPT) Students from the RUCOOL Masters in Operational Oceanography installed and configured a 5 MHz High Frequency radar in Sea Bright, NJ this past week The 2023-2024 class of the Masters in Operational Oceanography program just completed the High Frequency Radar module of their Field Lab Methods course MOO Spring Glider Deployment Success & Alex López selected as a Provost’s Teaching Fellow Rutgers Senior Studies the Ocean’s Impact on the World MOO Students Learn About Marine Radar At Furuno USA Inc MS of Operational Oceanography (MOO) Students Train with SEABER’s YUCO-SCAN Julia Engdahl Wins Three NOAA Awards Master’s of Operational Oceanography Students Explore the use of Drones for Remote Sensing Master’s of Operational Oceanography students deploy, pilot, and recover RU23 Congratulations to Tim Stolarz who successfully defended his Master’s thesis Ailey is a Master of Operational Oceanography Julia Engdahl Wins NOAA CO-OPS Professional Excellence Award Ted is a Master of Operational Oceanography Dual Glider Deployments for our Grad and Undergrad Crew Congratulations to Joe Anarumo for Successfully Defending his Masters Defense Congratulations to Julia Engdahl for her successful Masters defense A Busy Week for the RUCOOL Grad Student Field Team Previous Next Academic Program Our Students Our Team Our Advisory Board Admission Requirements Academic Program Gain Marketable Skills in 12 Months A combination of hands-on experience, research, and targeted coursework empowers our students to tackle real world challenges and provides them with an edge over other candidates in the job market. The Master of Operational Oceanography track is a compact 12-month Master of Science degree program providing thorough but efficient applied training for students from around the world. For Rutgers students, it also provides a concise path for marine science undergraduates to earn a master’s with a single year of additional training (a “4+1” model). With small class numbers and an individualized mentorship model, we support our students in building : marine science expertise collaborative skills observing system technology experience data literacy ocean modeling literacy communication skills job preparation Our Program The Master of Operational Oceanography track is grounded in a three prong approach: building foundational knowledge and practical skills through core courses, providing opportunities to gain real experience working with marine technology, and fostering connections with professionals and peers. Core Courses Summer Session III: 16:712:507 Field Laboratory Methods 1:This field course provides hands-on training in the field. The focus will be on providing a range of practical skills for the remote sensing and fixed point ocean data systems. Fall Semester: 16:712:501 Physical Oceanography:Physical properties and basic equations for describing waves, tides, currents, and the large-scale wind-driven and thermohaline circulation. Ekman, geostrophic, and inertial flows. Gulf Stream; air-sea interactions; El Niño. 16:712:505 Integrated Ocean Observing 1:The course exposes students to a wide range of operational data streams anchoring ocean forecasting with hands on training using Eulerian tools and time series approaches. 16:712:509 Integrated Ocean Observing – Software Bootcamp:The aim of the course is to introduce some widely used software tools and teach basic coding practices. The goal is to help students jump start research by acquiring the skills to work efficiently with their data. Topics to be covered include: Jupyter notebooks/lab, the Unix shell: interacting with your computer programmatically and reproducibly, Python programming (including common geoscience libraries: numpy, matplotlib, pandas, xarray, cartopy …), version control (git), accessing public earth science datasets. The course will assume no prior coding experience and is aimed at beginners. The course will aim to build a solid programming foundation to accelerate your data analysis. The course will culminate in a project of each student’s choosing. Ideally this will be a task that directly builds on/complements your research. 16:712:510 Operational Ocean Modeling/Visualization 1:Course provides an overview of the major modeling and numerical tools with a focus on using operational modeling systems, running the models, and using model outputs as a synthesis tool. 01:450:321 Geographic Information Systems:Geographic Information Systems (GIS) is a rapidly growing field that is increasingly popular for a wide range of spatial analyses. Some of the uses for GIS include environmental modeling, urban and land use planning, facilities management, social and demographic change analyses, economic development, site suitability analyses, marketing, and community development and enrichment initiatives. Spring Semester: 16:712:506 Integrated Ocean Observing 2:The course exposes students to a wide range of operational data streams anchoring ocean forecasting with hands on training using Lagrangian tools and time series approaches. 16:712:508 Field Laboratory Methods 2:This field course provides hands-on training in the field. The focus will be on providing a range of practical skills for using mobile autonomous systems. Field Experience Our students benefit from joining one of the worlds most advanced and longest operating ocean observatories. As part of our team, students work directly with our faculty, technicians, and partners across NJ and worldwide to deploy and repair gliders, help install and maintain our high frequency radar network, and operate marine equipment to support ongoing RUCOOL research. Mentoring Students participate in group and individual meetings throughout the program so that we can best support them both during the program and as they embark on their career path. Group meetings allow students to learn from and collaborate with the entire RUCOOL group. Meanwhile, 1-on-1 meetings help our faculty to identify and work with each student to meet their research and career goals. Our Students Edit Current Students Charlotte Bramich Sal Fricano Jesse Noble Nicholas Occhiogrosso Scott Pescatore Trivik Ragha Sophie Scopazzi Testimonials The Master’s in Operational Oceanography has given me the opportunity to pave my own

On behalf of Zdenka Willis, President of the Marine Technology Society (MTS), and Mary Munk, of the Walter Munk Foundation for the Oceans (WMFO), it is my pleasure to inform you of your selection as recipient of the Walter Munk Scholar Award and Commemorative Lecture. This award seeks to underscore the great importance of ocean science and technology; to recognize your achievements to date; and to encourage you to continue Walter Munk’s legacy of daring exploration and discovery throughout your career.  Given the highly competitive field of candidates from which you were chosen, we are confident that you will bring distinction to what will become a growing list of future Munk Scholars.

Congrats to Lauren! Their answer to the 2nd question: Why is the maritime sector significant to our nation’s COVID-19 recovery efforts, and what do you envision a ‘green-economy’ looks like?  “Tourism, recreation, commercial shipping, the coast guard, and the fisheries and aquaculture industry are all part of the maritime sector, and each of these sectors play a significant role in our nation’s COVID-19 recovery efforts. Tourism and recreation directly influence coastal economies and improve public health, emotional wellbeing, and are the backbone of coastal community culture. This will be much needed after over a year of mental and emotional stress for many. Commercial shipping is crucial in delivering supplies that keeps our nation afloat, and the coast guard plays a vital role in offering vaccination information and resources to this essential portion of our economy. The fisheries and aquaculture industry has kept nutritious food on the table for millions of Americans. As restaurants begin to reopen, the seafood supply from this sector will support the economy on land. In the great task of rebuilding the economy, the pandemic gives us an opportunity to reevaluate our long-term goals. The US has primarily focused on short-term, rescue-based measures like industry bailouts and stimulus packages. While these are helpful, they do not offer long-term economic stability. An ideal green economy would shift our primary reliance off fossil fuels and nonrenewable materials to renewable ones, while incorporating three core principles: resource efficiency, ecosystem-based decisions, and socioeconomic equality. This multidisciplinary approach would act like a triple-braided cord. Resource efficiency increases profits, ecosystem-based decisions ensure resources persist, and emphasizing socioeconomic equality creates a stronger, more inclusive base that holds the other two pillars in place.”