MEES IN THE NEWS

JUNE 2024 - ocean science month

NEWS ARCHIVE

Fish & Aquaculture: coastal ecosystem restoration

Fall ‘24 M.S. Glen Collins, Jr.

June 04, 2024 - Glen Collins, Jr. (‘24, ECOL SYS) is an incoming Fall 2024 MEES Master’s graduate student at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore. Glen will be advised by MEES faculty member Dr. Stephen Tomasetti, who specializes not only in global change ecology with emphasis on warming, deoxygenation, and acidification; but also resilience and climate-adapted habitat restoration, including aquaculture and sustainable coastal food systems. Prior to matriculating this Fall 24 in the MEES graduate program, Glen graduated this Spring 2024 with his Bachelor’s in Environmental Science with a concentration in marine science from the University of Maryland Eastern Shore. This New York native brings a wealth of research experience as well as a passion for aquaculture, improving fish populations, and restoring habitats. Glen was featured in a recent UMES article, which celebrates reaching this milestone, while summarizing the experiences and opportunities that helped shape his next steps in pursuing graduate studies. In Summer 2021, Glen participated in a Summer Bridge to Research in Marine Science Program at Savannah State University in Georgia where, under the direction of Dr. Marc Fisher, Glen conducted a research project on the population dynamics of Ascidians, or sea tulips, who are more commonly known as “sea squirts”: a marine invertebrate found in shallow water environments. Glen’s research focused on the nutritional value and the invertebrate’s summer recruitment to artificial substrates. Glen also had the opportunity in Summer 2022 to participate in two summer internships back to back: one as an intern at the Long Island Aquarium, where he assisted staff with fish and invertebrate’s husbandry of all public and non-public systems. According to Dr. Teddy Tilkin, Lead Aquarist at the Long Island Aquarium, this summer internship is the aquarium’s most competitive with a minimum 120 hour credit requirement. Additionally, Glen’s duties included cleaning snorkel tanks, reporting fish observations, and assisting in live food production. The second internship was at the Ohio State University/Stone Laboratory where Glen engaged in various workshops and acquired a great deal of field experience including kayaking, electrofishing, seining, assisting with trawls, otolith dissections, and the collection of phytoplankton and zooplankton. Right before graduating with his Bachelors, Glen completed a NOAA Student Scholarship Internship Opportunity (SSIO), where he conducted research at the Northeast Fisheries Science Center in Woods Hole, Massachusetts with Dr. Brian Smith. The research was centered around the “Regional food consumption rates and trophic demands for two squids (Doryteuthis pealeii and Illex illecebrosus) in the NW Atlantic”. Glen had the opportunity to present the results of that research at the 2023 Science and Education Symposium at NOAA headquarters in Silver Spring, MD.

According to the UMES feature, Glenn’ research will focus on oyster reef habitats and how fish utilize them. Using acoustic telemetry to track federally managed fish species in different habitats in the Chesapeake Bay, Glen hopes to conduct research that addresses climate change, and further explore developments in aquaculture, improve fish populations, and restoring habitats. Glenn has also actively participated in the UMES undergraduate community, being a founding member of the university’s Environmental Science Association. Glen and his fellow students were involved in an Earth Day celebration at UMES, which included planting a seedling from the historic Wye Oak on campus. This marine scientist aspires to a career with federal agencies like NOAA Fisheries, holding a deep passion for fish. We look forward to having Glen join the MEES program this Fall 2024. For more on Glenn, please click here.

ALUMNI CORNER

MEES RESEARCH CENTER

Tebyan Ahmed Photo Courtesy: UMES

Laura Gemery Photo Courtesy: ResearchGate

LEARN MORE ABOUT tebyan

LEARN MORE ABOUT LAURA

JONAS MILLER & JENS WIRA

2024 USM Board of Regents student excellence scholarship recipients

Congratulations to Jonas Miller, the recipient of the prestigious 2024 USM Board of Regents Student Excellence Scholarship for Academics, Scholarship and Research; an award given to only four graduate students across the USM system! Jonas Miller is a second year MEES Ph.D. student at the University of Maryland Baltimore County advised by longtime MEES Faculty member, Dr. Yonathan Zohar. Jonas has been conducting his doctoral research, at the Institute of Marine and Environmental Technology (IMET), which focuses on enhancing sustainable land-based aquaculture of Atlantic salmon, an area in which Dr. Zohar is a world leader. The end goal is to promote a consistent supply of domestic salmon for consumers by generating populations of fish that spawn at staggered times throughout the year, triggered by different light and temperature conditions in land-based facilities. Prior to joining the MEES graduate program, Jonas brings a wealth of experience and training; Jonas earned his B.A. in Aquaculture & Fishery Technology at the University of Rhode Island in May 2014, making the Dean’s List for every semester he was enrolled at URI. Jonas had the opportunity to work part-time as an Aquaculture Specialist at Boston Children’s Hospital (BCH) zebrafish research program. BCH utilizes the zebrafish (Danio rerio) as a model for human health and disease and hosts up to 12,000 tanks across three aquaculture facilities making it one of the largest and most active fish research programs in the world. Dr. Christian Lawrence, Assistant Director of Research Operations at BCH immediately noted Jonas’ intellectual curiosity, motivation, and communication in a very challenging and technical position which can be both dynamic and routine, requiring the ability to perform independently while still operating within a team. Jonas’ duties included recirculating aquaculture system management, zooplankton culture, data collection, maintenance of ongoing experiments, assessing animal health, and trouble shooting. Upon graduating from URI, Jonas was awarded a scholarship to obtain his M.S. degree in Aquaculture from Kindai University in Osaka Japan and graduated in March 2020. Dr. Lawrence notes the achievement of gaining admission to a graduate program at a highly selective Japanese university, while Jonas simply sees it as following his dream to study marine fish cultivation in Japanese aquaculture research. Jonas joined a team at Kindai University’s Aquaculture Research Institute (ARIKU) in Wakayma, Japan studying fish cultivation at the ARIKU Uragami Experiment Station. Uragami is a small rural fishing village that is a three hours drive away from Osaka and comprised of about roughly 400 people. Jonas recalls that he was the first and only American to reside in Uragami village, and the first American student at ARIKU. The practical (and intense) graduate school curriculum along with the experience gained in both laboratory and fish hatchery as well as in learning how to troubleshoot and problem solve many issues helped Jonas learn more about breeding, husbandry, disease prevention and feeding strategies of many marine fish native to the Wakayama prefecture. Jonas performed these duties all why learning to speak and write in Japanese as an adult, studying a highly technical subject in Japanese, and graduated with his Master’s in Aquaculture (2020). Dr. Amal Biswas, Associate Professor & Deputy Director at the Aquaculture Research Institute at Kindai University, who served as Jonas’ advisor, noted Jonas as an exceptional student, working as a team with the research staff and undergraduate students from Japan, Malaysia and Indonesia to complete research on the rearing of white trevally, a highly prized fish species in Japan of which only a tiny fraction of the catch is exported. Dr. Biswas also noted Jonas’ very keen ability to share his ideas with other researchers, while also being willing to explore some more ideas to contribute to the further development of sustainable aquaculture industry in both Japan and the United States. Since joining the MEES program, Jonas maintains a perfect 4.0 GPA, served as IMET’s GSA President, teaches weekly English classes to Chinese graduate students at IMET and has mentored high school students from South Carroll High School and Baltimore City College High volunteering at Dr. Zohar’s research group, providing instruction in aquaculture and molecular benchwork. In the UMBC article, Jonas sees the next step is to discover “new predictive biomarkers” and views the award as “an opportunity to propel [his] research to the next level”. We at the MEES Graduate program are proud of all of our exceptional scholars; Congratulations, Jonas, this is a well earned recognition for all your hard work! For more on Jonas, please click here.

Congratulations to Jens Wira, the recipient of the distinguished 2024 USM Board of Regents Student Excellence Scholarship for Innovation and Creative Activity; an award given to only four graduate students across the USM system! Jens Wira is a fourth year MEES Ph.D. student working in the lab of Dr. Allen Place at the Institute of Marine and Environmental Technology at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science. Jens doctoral research is focused on the molecular characterization of toxins from species like Amphidininium, Karlodinium and Karenia. He is also interested in using flavonoids to mitigate blooms of these species. Prior to joining the MEES program, Jens graduated (with honors) with a Bachelors of Science in Chemistry from the National University of Singapore (2019) (with honors), where, as part of the honors requirements, Jens completed a five month full time internship in the Toxins section of the Agri-Food & Veterinary Authority of Singapore (later reorganized and now known as the Singapore Food Agency). Jens was responsible for testing food for bacterial, mycotoxins, and marine biotoxins which allowed him to practice and develop analytical chemistry techniques. In 2018, Jens was selected for a Marine Science Research Development Program at the Institute of Marine and Environmental Technology in Baltimore, where under the guidance of Dr. Allen Place, Jens studied dinoflagellate toxin production by Amphidium carterae, a species that sometimes causes toxic algal blooms. This experience proved invaluable, as midway through the internship at the Agri-Food & Veterinary Authority of Singapore, a bloom of Karlodinium dinoflagellates occurred in the sea surrounding Singapore, which put the laboratory on high alert in preparation, since no official method existed in the lab for the detection of karlotoxins. This stirred Jens curiosity and passion to study harmful algal blooms, and using the experience at the Place lab, Jens developed a screening method to identify potentially novel karlotoxins, as well as demonstrated just how much harmful algal bloom (HAG) management can be advanced. Jens undergraduate research project was entitled: “Polyketide Synthesis in Amphidium carterae under Different Growth Conditions.” After earning his Bachelors of Science in Chemistry from NUS, Jens joined the MEES graduate program in Fall 2020 and has garnered numerous awards as well as demonstrated exceptional academic achievements. Jens maintains a perfect 4.0 GPA, has earned an award for nearly every year he has been in the MEES Program: the prestigious University of Maryland Dean’s Fellowship (2020, 2021), 2021 MEES Colloquium Best Presentation (3rd place), 2022 MEES Colloquium Best Student Poster (2nd place), and in 2022 Jens was selected for the highly distinguished Ratcliffe Environmental Entrepreneurship Fellowship (REEF), 2023 MEES Colloquium Best Presentation (2nd place), 2023 MEES Colloquium Best Poster (1st place) and the Debbie Morrin Nordlund Travel Award (2023). Jens has served as a graduate teaching assistant, has presented his research at numerous national and international conferences including the 2023 Gordon Research Conference on Phyco/Mycotoxins and the 2023 International Symposium in Okinawa on Ciguatera and Related Marine Biotoxins. Jens achievements extend past the academic: an Advanced Open Water certified diver, Jens is also a military veteran, having served as Platoon Commander in the Singapore Military Regiment, training fresh recruits into soldiers in basic military training. Jens recalls the experience of free-soloing off a small Japanese dam at 2 a.m. while fighting a bad infection in order to get his team of 3 members to safety as an opportunity to learn to be adaptable, responsible and tenacious. Jens is set to present his research on the movement behavior of the harmful dinoflagellate Gambierdiscus; which is the causative agent in ciguatera poisoning, a major burden on the seafood supply in the US and the world at the 2024 Phycological Society of America Meeting. His research aims to connect how their behavior might affect our ability to monitor them. We at the MEES Graduate Program are proud of all of our exceptional scholars! Congratulations, Jens, this is a well earned recognition of all your hard work! For more on Jens, please click here.

the arctic ostracode: an analysis of oceanographic conditions & climate change

laura gemery (Ph.D. ‘22)

Laura Gemery (‘22, Ph.D.) is an Ecologist with the United States Geological Survey (USGS) based at the Florence Bascom Geoscience Center in Reston, Virginia. Laura among other duties, analyzes Arctic modern and Quaternary microfossil faunal assemblages, integrates new faunal information/samples into an Arctic Ostracode Database (AOD). Laura earned her doctoral degree in MEES in Spring 2022. Under the advisement of Dr. Lee Cooper and Dr. Jacqueline Grebmeier, Laura’s doctoral research investigated the continental shelf environment of the Bering, Chukchi and Beaufort Sea using Ostracodes, a microfossil-forming group of bivalved Crustracea as ecological indicators of oceanographic conditions and change. Ostracodes secrete a calcareous shell commonly preserved in sediments in the Arctic, and have survival limits controlled by temperature, salinity, oxygen, sea ice, and other factors. Laura’s dissertation aimed to clarify how their ecology, biogeography and shell geochemistry are related to ocean variability in water mass properties and productivity at high latitudes. Following an analysis of community assemblages of ostracodes over several decades (1970-2018) which showed that large-scale south-to-north and small-scale nearshore-offshore gradients in ostracode community structures were tied to changes in water mass properties in combination with food sources and sediment substrate, a regression analysis stable oxygen isotopes values of carbonates from two species (of five investigated) of ostracode shells were demonstrated to be reliable recorders of summer water mass changes in temperature and seawater content. The overall findings supported the premise that on complex and dynamic continental shelves, paleoceanographic uncertainties can be addressed by documenting microfossil faunal assemblages, measuring stable isotope variability in microfossil carbonates. Prior to joining the MEES program, Laura earned a double major (Bachelor's of Arts) in both Zoology/Environmental Science and Journalism from Miami University in Spring 1990. While at Miami, Laura was a staff writer for The Miami Student, one of the oldest college newspapers in the United States. After graduating from Miami University, Laura matriculated into the MEES Master’s program in Fall 2010 while working for Envirotemps, Inc. (ETI), as a Research Technician, where she performed microfossil and sediment laboratory processing and preparation for faunal and geochemical analysis and radiocarbon dating. Laura’s thesis research focused on the temporal changes in benthic ostracode assemblages in the Northern Bering and Chukchi Seas. Laura graduated with her Master’s in MEES in 2012, her doctoral (Ph.D) degree in MEES in Spring 2022, and has garnered a wealth of research experience and expertise. Laura has worked for several decades in environmental science communication at the National Science Teachers Association’s Journal of College Science Teaching and the National Wildlife Federation’s National Wildlife magazine, and has currently spent nearly10 years as a research technician and ecologist in the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). This background ignited Laura’s passion for scientific research, and the desire for deeper knowledge in understanding environmental processes that control the biogeography and community composition of marine species and what effects past and recent climate change has had on their abundance, distribution and diversity. Currently at the USGS as an ecologist, Laura is also an Internal reviewer for colleague abstracts and journal papers, an external reviewer for Proceedings of the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (data report), Global and Planetary Change and Climate Dynamics. For more information on Laura, please click here.

Dr. XIN ZHANG

2024 USM Board of Regents award for outstanding research in sustainability & nutrient management in global agriculture

Dr. Xin Zhang is currently an Associate Professor at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, a current MEES Faculty member and the chair of the MEES Environment & Society foundation committee. The goal of Dr. Zhang’s current research is to evaluate how socioeconomic and biogeochemical processes affect the global nutrient cycle and the sustainability of agricultural production and, in turn, provide policy input on mitigating nutrient pollution while meeting global food and biofuel demands. Recently, Dr. Zhang was awarded the 2024 USM Excellence in Scholarship or Research Award, the highest honor that the University System of Maryland Board of Regents bestows to recognize exemplary faculty achievement. In the USM announcement, Dr. Zhang’s highly cited research in sustainability and nutrient management helps environmental scientists examine agricultural, energy, and food systems as key factors in our ability to respond to climate change, create water security, and improve nutrient management. In the May 2024 Cumberland Times-News article about the award, UMCES Professor, and a long-time MEES Faculty member, who served as UMCES interim President, Dr. William Dennison admires Dr. Zhang’s “outstanding ability to: provide clarity in messy-socio-environmental systems”, “develop rigorous methodologies to assess environmental, social and economic status” and effective communication as some of the many attributes that make Dr. Zhang “one of the most influential and important researchers that I have encountered in my long career in environmental science.” Dr. Zhang received a B.S. in Environmental Science and a B.S. in Computer Science from Ocean University of China (OUC), an M.A. in Environmental Science from Peking University (2007), and a Ph.D. from Yale University (2012). In addition, she has completed internships and projects at various national and international organizations, including the United Nations and China’s Ministry of Environmental Protection. Dr. Zhang, who mentors many MEES students, has secured more than $11M in research funding, published 36 peer-reviewed articles and initiated two transdisciplinary-and transnational-research networks. The key goal of Dr. Zhang’s research is to unravel the complex dynamics between human and natural systems, guiding policies and actions toward sustainability using data-driven and transdisciplinary approaches. We at the MEES Graduate Program are so very proud of our faculty whose exemplary skills, leadership, creativity, and mentoring have been recognized! For more on Dr. Zhang, please click here.

MEES RESEARCH CENTER

forage species in the north atlantic: a climate change impact study

Tebyan Ahmed Photo Courtesy: Village Of Hope

Tebyan Ahmed is a second year Master’s student at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore. Under the advisement of Dr. Ali Ishaque, Tebyan is pursuing a study on the latitudinal variation in the trophic ecology of forage species in the Northwest Atlantic Ocean. Prior to joining the MEES Program, this native Sudanese now U.S. citizen living in Salisbury, Tebyan earned (with honors) a Bachelor’s in Agricultural and Water Science from the Sudan University of Science and Technology in Khartoum in Fall 2012. Tebyan’s research, which included an internship in the Soil Chemistry Lab, and coursework focused on soil and water science including soil conservation and management. It was during a final seminar on Climate Change, that Tebyan realized the effects of climate change not just on agricultural crops, but its larger scale global implications including in her native country of Sudan. This ignited Tebyan’s passion to learn more on reaching her goal of working for NASA as a part of a team to help discover solutions to the climate change crisis. Tebyan matriculated into the MEES graduate program at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore in Fall 2022 focused on investigating the impacts of climate change on marine ecosystems. Tebyan’s master’s research specifically aims to further explore climate change impacts (temperature, acidity, and nutrients) on food web dynamics and its effect on primary producers which can impact and change the fatty acid compositions of higher trophic level species. Tebyan’s passion extends to serving the community as she is currently serving as a Board member for Village of Hope, a local Delmarva transitional home center for women and children dedicated to providing programs and services for at-risk women and their children. Tebyan has also actively served for over four years as a preschool teacher at the Kids-Land Learning Center in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where she supervised 16 children (primarily toddlers) teaching basic math and reading as well as social and emotional competence skills. Dr. Amy Heger, owner of Night Watch Child Care Center in Salisbury, MD, notes Tebyan as one of the best lead teachers passionate about helping others and learning new skills. Tebyan plans to continue her graduate studies and pursue a Ph.D. and a career in research that seeks solutions to the climate crisis. For more on Tebyan, please click here.

climate change, health and society: an interdisciplinary collaboration (UMB & the MEES graduate program)

June 11, 2024 - A new UMB article features an update on the launching of a joint collaborative effort between UMB and the MEES Graduate Program in a new MEES elective pilot course “Climate Change, Health, and Society” which aims to help inform professional students on the science of climate change as well as analyze it’s impacts and implications on human health and society. Dr. Shiladitya DasSarma, professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, who serves as the course director, sees climate change “[as] the defining issue of our time” requiring a pro-active approach. Dr. DasSarma also serves as the MEES UMB faculty representative in the MEES Program Committee. Launched this past Spring 2024, this 14 week course currently has 10 faculty involved from 5 different units (Schools of Medicine, Nursing, Law and Social Work (UMB), along with the Department of Atmospheric & Oceanic Science (UMCP). The course is open to law, medical, nursing, and social work students from UMB and MEES students and offers the opportunity to not only collaborate together and interact with external community members from Baltimore and beyond, but also to learn from and dialogue with scientists from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Air Resources Laboratory and Air Resources Car, which performs mobile measurement surveys to look for major greenhouse gasses and some air pollutants in the area. A special feature of the course was the Climate Stakeholders Panel which featured experts from state and federal agencies who discussed “the intersection of science and policy”, sharing local examples of success from Baltimore as well as the state of Maryland, and Cambridge, Massachusetts. For more information on this unique course, please click here.