Happy New Year! Here’s to a great start to the semester, and here’s the latest news from the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences at Stony Brook University!
Dr. Sharon Pochron and co-PIs Dr. David Taylor and Dr. Elizabeth Newman has received a new grant from the NSF IUSE program, in support of the project “Improving Outcomes for At-Risk STEM First-Year Students through Course-Based Undergraduate Research Experiences“, in the amount $293,933, for the period 1-15-23 – 12-31-25.
The project aims to serve the national interest by implementing Course-based Undergraduate Research Experiences (CUREs) for freshmen who are at risk of failing to graduate in four years. Undergraduate degree completion in STEM has been decreasing since 1970, threatening the historical preeminence in science and technology that the United States has enjoyed for the last 60 years. To promote STEM interest, motivation, and persistence, this project provides two CURE interventions for at-risk freshmen. The first CURE uses evidence-based pedagogical elements. The second CURE uses both pedagogical and STEM-belonging elements. Both CUREs aim to improve GPA, fidelity to a STEM major, and college retention. After each semester-long CURE intervention, the project will gather data on student success and perceptions of STEM belonging to assess the importance of each pedagogical and social element. This project will identify successful mechanisms within two types of CUREs so instructors and departments can build appropriate courses and scale them to potentially support at-risk STEM freshmen across US universities.
Undergraduate research experience (URE) positively impacts student retention and persistence in STEM, and an increasing number of well-controlled, large-scale, and longitudinal studies indicate that UREs can attract, retain, and improve the success of undergraduates in STEM. However, UREs traditionally occur as research apprenticeships where students work as part of a faculty member’s research group, and apprenticeships do not easily scale to serve entire cohorts of STEM-interested students. Researchers and educators have responded to these challenges by creating course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) to enrich STEM persistence and to retain diversity in the STEM pipeline. CUREs provide authentic and early research experiences to students at scale, engaging more students and diverse students relative to traditional apprenticed research experiences. Despite these benefits, open questions surround CUREs. Researchers want to know which aspects of CUREs lead to desirable student outcomes and what are the causal mechanisms underlying the efficacy of CUREs. The goal of this project is to identify this critical gap because understanding that mechanism would allow improved scalability and transferability. This project will provide an advanced understanding of a very specific question: How do CURES successfully support U1 STEM students who are at-risk of failing to graduate in four years? By the end of this project, up to 510 undergraduates and 1-3 graduate students will benefit from this improved CURE. This project will implement a suite of elements identified by literature as pedagogically impactful (experiential, active learning, authentic assessment, scaffolded mentorship, and civic engagement) designed to increase feelings of STEM belonging into a curriculum-based research experience (CURE). The project’s findings will benefit STEM students of the future by investigating conditions under which improved student learning occurs. By improving STEM education, developing educators of the future, and by increasing student access to these CURES, this project benefits society by increasing the STEM literate workforce, especially since the students targeted by this project are at-risk of failing to graduate in four years and have only a 45% of graduating at all. The enriched CURE will study the effectiveness of the pedagogical and social elements that should be included in new curricula to deliver courses which will retain undergraduate STEM students at-risk of failing to graduate in four years. The NSF IUSE: EHR Program supports research and development projects to improve the effectiveness of STEM education for all students. Through the Engaged Student Learning track, the program supports the creation, exploration, and implementation of promising practices and tools.
Dr. Kevin Reed was awarded a new NSF grant, from GEO-NERC (US-UK collaboration), in the amount $409,127, in support of the project “Collaborative Research: NSFGEO-NERC: Hurricane Risk Amplification and Changing North Atlantic Natural Disasters“, for the period 3/1/23 – 2/28/26.
Overview
This proposal represents Stony Brook University’s, Columbia University’s, and Pennsylvania State University’s part of an international agreement to better understand the risks posed by Cyclones of Tropical Origin. This collaborative proposal involves both UK and US components and was invited for submission by both NERC and NSF. In accordance with language in the Dear Colleague Letter NSF 16-132, NERC performed the merit review. The full proposal, submitted to NERC, is included with this NSF proposal as a supplementary document.
Some tropical cyclones (TCs) migrating into the mid-latitudes retain the physical characteristics of a hurricane, while others structurally evolve into post-tropical cyclones (PTCs). Both types, called Cyclones of Tropical Origin (CTOs), can be extremely intense and their hazards set them apart from typical extratropical cyclones (ETCs). The Overarching Objective of Huracán is to deliver a new, physically based understanding of the risks posed to the British Isles/Western Europe (BIWE) and the North-East United States (NEUS) by CTOs in a changing climate.
The risk of CTOs is currently poorly quantified, owing to a fundamental lack of evidence; yet these events are high-impact and are expected to become more frequent in the future. Poor theoretical understanding impedes confident projections. Huracán brings together world-leading expertise — from both sides of the Atlantic — to study, for the first time, the full life cycle of CTOs, a key requirement for scientific progress. Huracán will address fundamental knowledge gaps by exploiting diverse sets of observations, theoretical advances, and hypothesis-driven analysis of a wealth of numerical simulations, to provide actionable information to decision-makers. Huracán will explore physically plausible scenarios, given the predictable components of future climate and the conditional dependence of cyclone processes on those components. Huracán will experiment with the simulation of CTO-specific impacts and investigate worst-case configurations of the physical climate system. This concerted effort will transform the assessment of CTO risks across the North Atlantic mid-latitudes.
Dr. Yong Chen has received a new award from the State of Maine, entitled “Integrating and evaluating non-traditional gear technologies to reduce the risk to whales from fixed-gear fisheries“, from the State of Maine 2022 Sea Grant Lobster Program, in the amount $165,054, for the period 1/3/13 – 9/30/24.
To reduce entanglement risk to North Atlantic right whales from the Maine American lobster fishery, the vertical lines used to haul trap gear must be reduced in total number or strength. Ropeless fishing technologies have been proposed to reduce or eliminate the entanglement risk of vertical lines associated with fishing conventional lobster trap gear by releasing a vertical line before hauling the gear, reducing the residence time of the line in the water column. These technologies have the potential to greatly reduce entanglement risk by eliminating most vertical line presence in the Gulf of Maine, however, there remain several obstacles to their implementation.
The buoys atop vertical lines used in conventional fishing methods serve as de facto gear markers, reducing the overlap of fishing gear and potential for gear loss by conventional fishing methodologies. Ropeless technologies will need to simulate this incidental benefit by digitally marking gear location, however the technology accuracy and general efficacy of this method is not proven to work at the high gear densities seen in Maine inshore waters. Testing the precision of ropeless gear spatial representation against the spatially variable density of lobster gear across the Gulf of Maine will provide maps that grade the inshore fishery on the spatial suitability of ropeless implementation.
Ropeless fishing technologies vary immensely in their complexity and cost, presenting a barrier to implementation of expensive command-release technologies. Timed-release vertical lines could present an affordable method for reducing vertical line presence in the water column; however, the time of deployment must be carefully chosen to reflect trap soak time needs and the capacity of fishers to check their gear. Delays between timed-release triggers and fishers hauling their gear represent time the vertical line is suspended in the water column and will have an entanglement risk associated with them. We will validate the frequency and severity of delay times across fisher gear configurations and present a risk threshold based on vertical line breaking strength and water column residency times. Collecting data across seasonal timescales is critical to capture the differences in seasonal fishery dynamics and entanglement risk, variable with the seasonal Gulf of Maine residency of NARW. We will model the predicted delay times and risk potential spatially based on the oceanographic variables that drive both vertical line strength requirements and fisher gear hauling delays. These data are integral to providing an accurate cost-benefit analysis of ropeless implementation to reduce entanglement risk to NARW.
Dr. Lesley Thorne, and co-PIs Dr. Charlie Flagg, Dr. Joe Warren, and Dr. Jack McSweeney have a new award from NYSERDA, in support of the project “GLIDE: Glider based ecological and oceanographic surveys of the New York Bight“, in the amount $408,905, for the period May 26, 2022 – July 31, 2025.
This project will deploy and analyze glider-collected data from the Hudson South and Central Bight wind energy development sites in coordination with collaborators at Rutgers University. The Stony Brook University effort will be responsible for two (of four total) glider surveys each year of the project to collect physical oceanographic, passive acoustic, and other ancillary data to support the project objectives. The presence of vocalizing baleen whales will be measured through the use of a DMON recorder integrated into the SBU glider. The DMON data will be transmitted and analyzed (in near realtime during glider operations) through a sub-contract to Mark Baumgartner at WHOI covering both SBU and Rutgers glider deployments. Hydrographic measurements from the glider surveys will be used to assess the extent and strength of the cold pool on a seasonal basis in the two wind energy development areas. Additional glider-based oceanographic datasets that will be collected as part of this study include: pH, dissolved oxygen, chl-a/fluoresence, and turbidity. An Innovasea/Vemco 69kHz fish tag detector will also be integrated into the glider to provide data on the presence of organisms that have been tagged by other researchers. A post-doctoral researcher funded by this project will be responsible for assisting with glider deployment, maintenance, and recovery operations; analyzing the physical oceanographic data sets, and integrating this information with data from the passive acoustic and other sensors aboard the glider to better understand the impacts of hydrographic drivers on the presence of baleen whales and other marine organisms.
Dr. Sharon Pochron has her second NSF grant in as many months, as a co-PI on the following grant – an NSF Convergence Accelerator’s 2022 Cohort Phase 1 Award in support of the project “Sustainable Nature-based Materials for Remediation Solutions to Climate Change”, in the amount $570,165, for the period 1/1/2023 to 1/1/2024, PI: Benjamin Hsiao (Chemistry), and Co-PIs: Dilip Gersappe, Darren Martin, Sharon Pochron, and Katheryn Twiss
To tackle climate change, the Sustainable Nature-based Nanomaterials for Remediation Solutions to Climate Change project aims to plan the development of cross-disciplinary expertise and infrastructure to advance low-cost and scalable manufacturing technologies to produce sustainable nature based nanocellulose from versatile biomass feedstocks — a critical step toward circular processes for infrastructure protection and food-water security. The specific goals of the project include the planning of (1) eco-friendly manufacturing processes to produce high-value remediation nanomaterials in the form of biogels and composites, (2) sustainable and adaptable solutions based on these nanomaterials for infrastructural protection and food-water systems resiliency through full lifecycle, sustainability and circular economy considerations, and (3) workforce development to cultivate a diverse and inclusive community of future professionals and scientists with environmental sensibility, social equity and problem-solving abilities.
A cross-cutting, multidisciplinary and multi-institution team, involving researchers, entrepreneurs, educators and practitioners from university, industry, government and nonprofit organizations, has been assembled to cultivate a clear path to transition the proposed technologies into practice. The core competency of this proposal lies on the integration of complementary low-cost nanocellulose and hydrogel/composite manufacturing technologies by a U.S. team (Stony Brook University) and an Australian team (University of Queensland). A broadening participation plan, aiming to include stakeholders from different backgrounds and underrepresented groups is also proposed to capture a diverse set of ideas, perspectives and expertise. The major deliverables of this project aim to yield viable business cases for different applications using nanocellulose technologies: climate change mitigation (e.g., methods to minimize coastal erosion, reduce desertification in farmlands, and enable food-water security) and pollution reduction (e.g., reduction of plastic-waste by combining nanocellulose and used plastic component). These business cases will be prioritized using a human-centered design approach considering economic value, impact and feasibility.
Stony Brook News Highlights
Center for Italian Studies Announces Date for 17th Annual Robert D. Cess Concorso d’Eleganza Car Show
Latest Seminars
Dr. Kieran Bhatia from Guy Carpenter, TAOS January 25, 2023 “A Potential Explanation for the Global Increases in Tropical Cyclone Rapid Intensification“.
Latest Publications
Jordan, F. D., Shaffer, S. A., Conners, M. G., Stepanuk, J. E., Gilmour, M. E., Clatterbuck, C. A., … & Thorne, L. H. (2022). Divergent post-breeding spatial habitat use of Laysan and black-footed albatross. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, 10.
Schwaner, C., Farhat, S., Haley, J., Pales Espinosa, E., & Allam, B. (2022). Proteomic and Transcriptomic Responses Enable Clams to Correct the pH of Calcifying Fluids and Sustain Biomineralization in Acidified Environments. International Journal of Molecular Sciences, 23(24), 16066.
Chávez, R. O., Meseguer-Ruiz, O., Olea, M., Calderón-Seguel, M., Yager, K., Meneses, R. I., … & Prieto, M. (2023). Andean peatlands at risk? Spatiotemporal patterns of extreme NDVI anomalies, water extraction and drought severity in a large-scale mining area of Atacama, northern Chile. International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation, 116, 103138.
Tomasetti, S. J., Hallinan, B. D., Tettelbach, S. T., Volkenborn, N., Doherty, O. W., Allam, B., & Gobler, C. J. (2023). Warming and hypoxia reduce the performance and survival of northern bay scallops (Argopecten irradians irradians) amid a fishery collapse. Global Change Biology, 00, 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.16575
Tang, Y., Wang, M., Lee, C. S., Venkatesan, A. K., & Mao, X. (2023). Characterization of 1, 4-dioxane degrading microbial community enriched from uncontaminated soil. Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology, 1-15.
Wehrmann, L. M., Swenson Perger, D. A., Dwyer, I. P., Volkenborn, N., Heilbrun, C., & Aller, R. C. (2023). Ideas and perspectives: The benthic iron flux from sandy advective bioturbated sediments. Biogeosciences Discussions, 1-21.
Bokuniewicz, H. (2023). A subterranean estuarine typology analogous to open-water estuaries. Frontiers in Earth Science, 10, 694781.
Press Highlights
Concord Monitor: Could trawler cams help save world’s dwindling fish stocks?
- “If they want to do something they definitely can,” said Yong Chen, a fisheries scientist whose lab at Stony Brook University in New York hosts regular exchanges with China. “It’s just a question of priorities.”
Department of Energy: High-Pressure Systems Favor Sea-Breeze Convection Over Southeastern Texas
- This research classified synoptic regimes during the summer months (June-September) in the southeastern Texas region using Self-Organizing Map (SOM), an unsupervised machine learning approach. The team included scientists from Brookhaven National Laboratory, Pennsylvania State University, Purdue University, SUNY Geneseo, Stony Brook University, and Cornell University.
India Education Diary: University Of Saskatchewan Chemist Bags Honour Of The National Institute’s Early Career Research Award
- Dr. Paul Shepson (PhD), dean of the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences at Stony Brook University in New York, wrote that the analytical methods Kahan has developed to characterize physical and chemical properties of air-ice interfaces have led to new insights about reactions in snow-covered regions and “shattered” long-held views.
New York Times: Ken Balcomb, 82, Dies; Revealed the Hidden World of Killer Whales
- “I’m a musician, and I have a decent ear, and I could not understand how he was disentangling the squeaks and squeals,” Carl Safina, an author and ecologist who teaches at Stony Brook University and knew Mr. Balcomb well, said in a phone interview. Also ran in the Boston Globe.
Open Gov Asia: U.S. Uses AI and ML to Study Weather and Thunderstorms
- Moreover, during the summer months (June-September), the researchers exercised Self-Organising Map (SOM), an unsupervised machine learning approach, to classify synoptic regimes in the southeastern Texas region. Brookhaven National Laboratory, Pennsylvania State University, Purdue University, SUNY Geneseo, Stony Brook University, and Cornell University were all represented on the team.
ReadMedia Newswire: ON EVE OF STATE OF THE STATE, GROUPS URGE ACTION TO MAKE POLLUTERS – NOT TAXPAYERS – PAY FOR CLIMATE DAMAGES
- “Events, like last month’s tragic and extreme snowstorm in Buffalo which is just the latest in a recent string of storms impacting New Yorkers, are becoming worse due to human-caused climate change. As these storms continue to get more and more extreme, we’ll see more and more damage and lives lost,” said Kevin Reed, Associate Professor, School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences at Stony Brook University.
East Hampton Star: Letters to the Editor for January 12, 2023 (Nitrogen Overload)
- “Suffolk County public water is in the top 5 percent of nitrate levels in the U.S.,” according to Stony Brook’s Chris Gobler, probably the most-recognized authority on Long Island’s ground and surface water problems. Dr. Gobler reports that this level of nitrate pollution puts us at increased risk for colon, bladder, gastric, ovarian, and kidney cancer. This is not good. We sit on top of a sole-source aquifer, and our misguided actions have caused this problem.
Long Island Advance: Save The Great South Bay reflects on 2022
- With the help of Dr. Christopher Gobler, of Stony Brook University’s Gobler Laboratory, Save The Great South Bay presented its annual State of the Bay address during their Fall Speaker Series.
East Hampton Star: Bits and Pieces 01.12.23
- Patricia Paladines, who uses photography to share stories about the natural world, and Carl Safina, a professor at Stony Brook University whose writings explore how humans are changing that world, will be at the South Fork Natural History Museum on Saturday afternoon at 1:30 to discuss “Engaging Curiosity Through Art and Storytelling.”
East Hampton Star: The Art Scene 01.12.23
- A talk by Patricia Woodruff of the Stony Brook School of Marine and Atmospheric Studies will take place on Friday, Jan. 20, at 6 p.m.
Times Beacon Record: Artist Anne Seelbach explores the essence of environment in latest exhibit, ‘Elements Adrift’
- As a complement to the exhibition, Gallery North will present a lecture on the marine ecology of New York’s waterways by Patricia Woodruff from the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences at Stony Brook University on Jan. 20 at 6 pm.
Times Beacon Record: Making Democracy Work: Studying and protecting marine life and habitats
- Under the Long Island Shellfish Restoration Program (LISRP), the DEC in partnership with Cornell Cooperative Extension, Stony Brook University, and the Town of Huntington completed the stocking of 13.6 million juvenile (seed) clams and (spat-on-shell) oysters and 650,000 adult clams in Huntington Harbor in October 2020 to improve water quality and enhance shellfish populations.
DT Next/New York Times: Ken Balcomb: Expert who revealed hidden world of orcas
- Carl Safina, an author and ecologist who teaches at Stony Brook University on Long Island and knew Balcomb well, said in a phone interview, “I’m a musician, and I have a decent ear, and I could not understand how he was disentangling the squeaks and squeals.”
Jordan News/New York Times: How climate change can supercharge snowstorms
- This is a common question. So last winter, as another intense snowstorm blanketed a large part of the US, the New York Times put it to Kevin Reed, an associate professor at the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences at Stony Brook University on Long Island.
Eco Magazine: New Study Suggests Summer Heatwaves and Low Dissolved Oxygen Levels Endanger the Production of Bay Scallops in New York
- A new study by Stony Brook University researchers published in Global Change Biology demonstrates that warming waters and heat waves have contributed to the loss of an economically and culturally important fishery, the production of bay scallops. As climate change intensifies, heat waves are becoming more and more common across the globe. In the face of such repeated events, animals will acclimate, migrate, or perish.
am New York: Sunrise Wind is laying the foundation for New York’s clean energy future
- The offshore wind project’s collaborative efforts also extend beyond unions, with a $5 million commitment to Stony Brook University’s Advanced Energy Research and Technology Center. This is an investment in next generation clean energy research initiatives, ensuring offshore wind continues to innovate and improve in the decades to come.
Innovate LI: SoMAS study: Peconic Bay die-off is only the beginning
- Stony Brook University scientists are sounding alarms over an evolving fisheries crisis – a global concern already decimating economically critical industries in Long Island waters.
My Droll: Summer heat waves and low oxygen prove deadly for bay scallops as a New York fishery collapses
- A new study by Stony Brook University researchers published in Global Change Biology demonstrates that warming waters and heat waves have contributed to the loss of an economically and culturally important fishery, the production of bay scallops. As climate change intensifies, heat waves are becoming more and more common across the globe. In the face of such repeated events, animals will acclimate, migrate, or perish. Also ran in The Daily Check, Archynetys, Democratic Underground, Sky News, Phys.org and News Concerns.
Three Village Patch: Peconic Bay Scallop Die-Off Due To Global Warming, Heat Waves: Study
- The study, commenced by Stony Brook University researchers and published in Global Change Biology, indicated that global warming has contributed to the loss of bay scallops.
Futurity: Summer heat waves have devastated NY bay scallops
- “Global warming is happening at an uneven pace in space and time. It just so happens that summer water temperatures in the Northeast are increasing at a rate more than three times the global average, leaving organisms adapted to cooler temperatures endangered,” says senior author Christopher Gobler, chair of coastal ecology and conservation at Stony Brook University.
Seafood News: Summer Heat Waves and Low Oxygen Prove Deadly for Bay Scallops as a New York Fishery Collapses
- A new study by Stony Brook University researchers published in Global Change Biology demonstrates that warming waters and heat waves have contributed to the loss of an economically and culturally important fishery, the production of bay scallops.
Newsday: Warming waters affecting bay scallops, SBU researchers confirm
- A new paper by top Stony Brook University professors in the journal Global Change Biology formalizes the findings. A summer heat wave that lasted for just over a week in 2020, for instance, coincided with repeated episodes of lower dissolved oxygen, stressing the scallops, according to Christopher Gobler and Stephen Tomasetti of Stony Brook University’s School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences.
WSHU-TV: Peconic Bay scallop die-offs are “a cautionary tale” for New England
- Once one of the largest fisheries on the East Coast, Peconic Bay scallops have faced near complete die-offs on Long Island since 2019. A study by Stony Brook University shows this could be a cautionary tale for New England. Also ran on WBUR-FM.
Coastal News Today: NY – Climate Change Proves Deadly for Northern Bay Scallops
- A new study by Stony Brook University researchers published in Global Change Biology demonstrates that warming waters and heat waves have contributed to the loss of an economically and culturally important fishery, the production of bay scallops.
Newsday: Expansion of wastewater surveillance for infectious diseases planned
- “Given that mass public testing for COVID in New York largely ended in 2022 with the advent of home testing, and given the pandemic has become endemic, wastewater surveillance has become the primary tool for understanding community infection rates,” Stony Brook University marine sciences professor Christopher Gobler said in a statement. “In addition, it is now an incredibly useful tool for tracking outbreaks of other communicable diseases like the polio virus outbreak in New York in 2022.”
WBUR News: Scallops dying off in Long Island are ‘a cautionary tale’ for New England
- Christopher Gobler, a co-author and endowed chair of coastal ecology and conservation in the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences, used satellite thermal imaging and recorded scallop heartbeats to measure how less oxygen and warming waters put stress on shellfish populations. Data shows over the past two decades, the Peconic Bay estuary — and the entire Northeast — are warming at rates during summer that far exceed global average; Gobler said, “about threefold higher.” “We found that when placed in areas that were experiencing heatwaves, all the scallops died, whereas the ones that were in cooler temperatures, they survived,” he said. Also ran in Saving Seafood.
Syracuse.com: NY will soon use wastewater to track RSV, hepatitis, other pathogens
- The health department’s partners are Syracuse University, the state Department of Environmental Conservation, SUNY Environmental Sciences & Forestry, University at Buffalo, and Stony Brook University. Also ran in Times Union.
27 East: Stony Brook Study Pins Scallop Die-offs to Warming Temperatures, Climate Change
- Scientists from Stony Brook University say that they have definitively linked the massive die-offs of bay scallops in the Peconic Estuary over the past four years to climate change, and especially to a steep warming trend in the region since the turn of the century.
