Comb jellies, or ctenophores, are some of the most abundant organisms in the open ocean, and their voracious hunting satisfies their big appetites. But away from their deeper-water home, in the care of humans, they are fickle and finicky. When captured in jars, their fragile tentacles and gelatinous bodies are often damaged. In laboratory settings, they are intolerant of shifts in salinity and temperature, and sometimes refuse to feed.
In the late 1970s, Linda Glover visited BIOS, then the Bermuda Biological Station for Research, for the first time. “I had visited marine research labs in many countries, but I was particularly charmed by the beauty of BIOS and Bermuda,” Glover said. Decades later, she received “an entirely unexpected call from the chairman of the BIOS board, Michael Naess, asking if I would like to become a trustee.” She had worked with Naess and another trustee, John Knauss, in the 1980s when they served on the U.S. Presidential Ocean Policy Commission. “While very flattered by the offer, I was still working at the time for the United States government and accepting the board position would have created a conflict of interest,” she said.
A novel partnership between BIOS’s Ocean Academy and the University of Delaware (UDel) this winter gave dozens of local teachers and students the opportunity to learn about marine robotics and how they are used to explore the oceans.
Like to snorkel? Interested in supporting emerging marine engineers? Volunteers from BIOS and the Bermuda community are needed to assist on Saturday, April 27 from 8:00a.m. to 3:00p.m., as more than 30 teams of school students test their mission-tasked Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs) during the annual island-wide robotics challenge.
The 2019 Aquatic Sciences Meeting of the Association for the Sciences of Limnology and Oceanography (ASLO) took place February 24 to March 1 in San Juan, Puerto Rico. This biennial scientific conference brings together scientists, students, and policy-makers from around the world to present research on a variety of themes relating to aquatic sciences, including remote sensing, aquatic biodiversity, climate change, carbon cycling, and transitioning scientific research into meaningful applications.
How could a group of 15 students from diverse cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds—and separated by hundreds of miles— work together to address a real-world ecological issue? That’s what a team of educators is set to find out with new funding from the National Geographic Society.
During the last glacial period much of the Northern Hemisphere was blanketed by one or more sheets of ice. Throughout this period, chunks of these continental ice sheets often broke off and surged into the North Atlantic, carrying with them large amounts debris and freshwater. These events, called Heinrich events, are often thought to have been responsible for changes in ocean circulation patterns; specifically, weakening the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), a system of currents that transports water and heat from the Southern to the Northern Hemisphere in the Atlantic basin.
Each year a handful of Bermudian students are selected to participate in the BIOS Bermuda Program. This program, which began in 1976, offers students aged 18 and older the opportunity to broaden their knowledge of marine and atmospheric sciences by working on a specific project of interest alongside BIOS scientists in both field and laboratory settings.
A team of scientists from Yale University traveled to BIOS in May to study the Portuguese man o’ war, a frequent visitor to the waters around Bermuda during spring and early summer.
Both BIOS and Bermuda College are known for providing outstanding educational opportunities in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) subjects for the island’s young people. While the Bermuda College is a degree-granting institution and BIOS is a not-for-profit research and education facility that focuses on training local students in primary, middle, and high school, both organizations have a similar goal: to provide the island’s children and young adults with the knowledge, skills, and experiences required for future success in academics and the workforce.