Update on Sea Lab-Hosted Meetings

The Sea Lab faculty and staff  recently hosted a number of successful events held on campus and in Mobile.

The 33rd Annual Benthic Ecology Meeting was held March 25-27 in Mobile, with over 400 attendees from across the country and around the world.  Organized by Dr. John Valentine with the assistance of Drs. Sean Powers, Rich Aronson and Ken Heck, the BEM was widely praised for being well-organized, well-attended and highly informative.  The next Benthic Ecology Meeting will be held at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science.

Discovery Day at the Dauphin Island Sea Lab, held April 3, was a family fun day of marine science activity and education.  Approximately 1,000 visitors came to tour the research facilities, craft marine science artwork and meet several government agencies with enviromental interests.  The Sea Lab would like to acknowledge Port City Rentals and Coca-Cola for their sponsorship of this annual event; we’d also like to thank the myriad agencies that came to participate, including:  ADCNR, Marine Resources; ADCNR, State Lands Division, Coastal Section; Auburn University Marine Extension and Research Center; Azalea Trail Maids; Environmental Studies Center; Home Depot; Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium; Mobile Bay National Estuary Program; Mobile County Emergency Management Agency; Town of Dauphin Island; United States Coast Guard Station Dauphin Island; United States Coast Guard Auxiliary; and others.  Our next Discovery Day is scheduled for Saturday, April 2, 2005 – so mark your calendars!

The 11th Annual Wiese Distinguished Lecturer was Dr. Jeremy B.C. Jackson, a world-famous oceanographer from Scripps Institution of Oceanography.  Known for his work on “shifting baselines,” or the need for paleohistorical records of ocean abundance, Dr. Jackson offered a public talk at the University of South Alabama on April 28 with approximately 175 people in attendance.  The Wiese Lecture Series was established through the generosity of Fairhope, AL residents Pete and Marty Wiese in order to bring internationally-renowned scientists to the University of South Alabama and the Sea Lab to interact with the public, faculty and graduate students of both institutions.

What’s next?

Dr. Monty Graham will organize“DIALOG VI,” or“Dissertations Initiative for the Advancement of Limnology and Oceanography” at the Sea Lab on October 30-November 6. Designed to expose recent Ph.D.s to the professional marine science and academic community, the workshop is open to Ph.D.s completed April 1, 2002-March 31, 2004; a committee will select 40 participants based on the application materials submitted.  For more information on DIALOG VI, please visit http://www.disl.org/research.html.