FSU Department of Oceanography Newsletter
No. 18 Summer 1999
O'Brien is FSU Professor of the Year
Dr. James O'Brien, director of the FSU Center for Oceanic and Atmospheric Prediction Studies (COAPS), and FSU Distinguished Research Professor of Meteorology and Oceanography, continues to attract attention to his climate prediction research and educational programs.
During spring commencement of this year, O'Brien was presented the Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Professor Award, the highest honor FSU bestows on faculty for excellence in teaching, research and service on national and international levels.
Earlier this summer O'Brien was named State Climatologist for Florida by the National Climatic Data Center. He will run the Florida Climate Center (FCC), which provides climate data to the government and public. Anyone needing information about climate or weather can use the center's services. Since O'Brien was appointed, he has seen many interesting queries from a diverse crowd - from defense lawyers, farmers, golf course contractors, to pool doctors, all of whom were trying to solve practical problems relating to weather or climate issues. O'Brien has helped answer inquiries on climate change during El Niño/La Niña years from many people, including Florida utility companies. "I am going to bring the knowledge of El Niño that oceanographers discovered to the people of Florida," said O'Brien. For more information on FCC, go to http://www.coaps.fsu.edu/climate_center.
Recently, O'Brien was part of a team given the first FSU Research Foundation's Center of Excellence Award to create a climate prediction institute that will use a multi-disciplinary approach to improve on the current methods of severe storm prediction within the state (see page 3).
A FSU faculty member since 1969, O'Brien has published more than 100 articles on his research and has received more than 80 federal research grants. He has served on many national and international meteorological boards and journal editorial boards, and has testified before congressional committees.
He has been president of the oceanography section of the American Geophysical Union and of the International Association of Physical Sciences of the Ocean, and the chair of Section W for the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).
In 1985, U.S. Secretary of the Navy John Lehman appointed O'Brien to a Secretary of the Navy Research Chair in Oceanography, one of only two such chairs in the United States. He retains this title as well as the $250,000 a year research support from the ONR.
O'Brien is a Fellow of the American Meteorological Society (1981); the Royal Meteorological Society, London (1983); the American Geophysical Union (1988); and the AAAS (1988). The ONR named him Distinguished Ocean Educator in 1989, and in 1987 he received the Sverdrup Gold Medal in Air-Sea Interaction, a.k.a. "Nobel Prize of meteorology." In 1991, he became the first professor at FSU to receive the Distinguished Research Professor Award. Since 1994, O'Brien has also been a Foreign Fellow of the Russian Academy of Natural Science, an honor he is especially proud of.
O'Brien has been interested in science since childhood. He confessed that during high school he and friends would have informal math competitions, "we used to solve math problems for fun and then compare our answers!" He earned a bachelor's degree in chemistry from Rutgers University and master's and doctoral degrees in meteorology from Texas A&M University.
In the mid-1970's, a paper by Klaus Wyrtki sparked O'Brien's interest in El Niño and climate prediction studies. This led him to develop the first models using wind data to show amplitude and timing of El Niño. "No one believed us at the time," said O'Brien. He continued to pursue the investigation of El Niño along with other people, doing hind-cast studies, wind monitoring, and predictions 3-6 months in advance. His work paved the way for scientists to determine how the destructive patterns affect the world and to begin to forecast droughts, floods, and other extreme weather events.
"Around 1990, I became aware that everyone was looking at the impact of El Niño in non-U.S. regions. So, we started doing studies closer to home," said O'Brien. In the early 1980's, O'Brien was working on these problems with Antonio Busalacchi, one of his Ph.D. students at the time, and is particularly proud of the work they did together on seasonal circulation.
For the past five years, O'Brien's second home has been at COAPS which currently supports 14 graduate students and 12 undergraduate researchers. Research there is conducted on a variety of subjects from scatterometry to biogeochemistry to air-sea interactions. Recently, COAPS joined the Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science (RSMAS), U. of Miami, and the Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (IFAS), U. of Florida, to create the Florida Consortium. The Florida Consortium will be working on El Niño prediction for Florida's farmers. For more information, see: http://www.coaps.fsu.edu/lib/Florida_Consortium/.
Proposed Climate Institute Given the Center for Excellence Award
The FSU Research Foundation gave the first Center for Excellence Award, one of the Universities' Cornerstone Programs with up to $1 million in funding, to establish a climate prediction institute.
The Climate Institute (CI) is a multi-disciplinary team effort between FSU and the University of Miami (UM). Dr. William Dewar, who will lead the ocean modeling group, in collaboration with Dr. T.N. Krishnamurti and DR. J.J. O'Brien (FSU Meteorology Department), and Dr. M. Yousuff Hussaini (FSU Mathematics Department), submitted the proposal. The CI oceanographers from UM are Dr. Rainer Bleck and Dr. Eric Chassignet.
The focus of the new Climate Institute's research will be on understanding and predicting many aspects of global climate, with particular interest on how they affect the regional climate of the southeastern U.S. The model will unite ocean, ice, land and atmosphere models, already in existence, within an advanced computational framework. An emphasis on the utilization of modern data products will also be included. The Institute will be refining and combining models such as the Miami Isopycnic Coordinate Ocean Model (MICOM), for the ocean side of the coupled system and the FSU Climate System Model (FSUCSM), an atmospheric model developed at FSU.
"The outcomes of our objectives will be the founding of the next generation of coupled global circulation numerical laboratory that will be a reliable tool for climate prediction and study. It will enjoy the full sophistication of contemporary programs and be designed for users who are not experts in numerics," Dewar said in the proposal.
The FSU Cornerstone Program for Centers of Excellence (COE) Grant is designed for seeding major new synergistic programs of long-term significance to the university. The goal of COE is to advance the productivity and international and national recognition and stature of FSU by such accomplishments as attracting "star quality" faculty members to FSU, generating new sources of university funding, and producing innovations and technologies for public benefit. Seed funding under the COE program will be provided for a period of up to two years. The FSU Office of Research is at http://www.research.fsu.edu/.
Oliff: Eleven Years with the Department
Dave Oliff has his work cut out for him all around. A family man with six children at home, on the clock he is a devoted part of the department's busy Machine Shop team. Oliff has been the department's Senior Engineering Technician/Designer since February 1988, and his comments on the job sounds somewhat like a proud father commenting on parenthood: "I really enjoy participating in a new project from start to finish; developing methods on the way, working along side with the investigators, and watching the project evolve and change."
Like kids, many of the projects he works on for researchers come without instruction manuals, but being part of the process of invention and innovation is especially satisfying Oliff said. Whether its designing apparatus for the two extensive labs for the Orimulsion Project or making specialized spearheads for tagging large grouper, Oliff enjoys the challenges presented to him. "I like to look for design solutions that are elegantly simple. When something works so well in its simplicity, it's like an aha! moment," he said.
"The Machine Shop is often the interface between our faculty's visions and the means to achieving results," Oliff says. Whether designing field or laboratory equipment, foresight is essential on everyone's part, according to Oliff, because the design and planning for a single apparatus is very different from something that will be mass-produced. "I have learned to ask right away: If this works well, what are you going to do next and how much would you like to do?" Oliff said. He has enjoyed working with Dave Hunley (Current Meter Facility) because of his perceptive vision for long-range design implementation, Oliff added.
Oliff is well prepared for the challenges of his position for he has worked on everything from photo-etching to welding to tanker manufacturing to small part manufacturing before coming to the department. One of the biggest tasks here is making things work in the face of time allowances, budget, and available materials Oliff said. And, he acknowledged, even though he personally dislikes duct tape, for those headed to the field it could be a No. 1 toolbox item!
Oliff's lifelong desire is to "always be interested in my job- I am continually realizing new potential in this job." Indeed, according to Jim Winne, Oliff "applies all of his skill and inquisitiveness to every project that he undertakes and is totally involved in every aspect pertaining to that project."
One ongoing project Oliff has been working on over the years is for the Thistle Lab; a 15' long plexiglass flume designed to simulate an ocean sediment environment with various conditions for copepod research. This has resulted in half a lab's worth of steel frames and plexiglass tanks, pumps, and hoses. "At the time we started, there weren't many flumes with our particular design elements. As the needs of the lab have increased, we have continually improved on the original idea and consequentially increased the original water capacity by a third," said Oliff.
Oliff has lived in Tallahassee since 1960. He was in the first graduating class of Lincoln High School in 1978. He attended Tallahassee Community College and Lively Vocational and Technical School, and is an active member of his church. He met his wife, Harriet, through church and after five years of friendship and three more years of courtship, they were married in 1981. The Oliff's have six children under the age of 14: Morgan Hall (age 13.5), Meredyth Hope (age 10), Madison Hall (age 9), Mallory Hall (age 7), Monroe Hall (age 6), and Melanie Hope (age 3.5). Dave and Harriet home-school all of the children with Harriet putting in most of the time as teacher (and Melanie runs the house).
QuickSCAT Update
By Mark Bourassa
A satellite launched June 19, 1999 promises to deliver a better understanding of such climate phenomena as El Niño, weather forecasts, and provide exceptionally accurate forcing for ocean models. The NASA mission called QuikSCAT is a response to the loss of observations from the catastrophic failure of the ADEOS-I satellite platform. QuikSCAT will orbit Earth approximately every 100 minutes. In one day, it gathers 400,000 observations of wind speeds and directions over water. This quantity is an order of magnitude greater than the total number of in-situ observations from ships and buoys. The coverage is unprecedented, at approximately 90% of the worlds' ocean each day. Meteorologists and climatologists around the world will use the data for improved storm warnings and weather forecasting by more accurately determining the paths of hurricanes and tropical storms. COAPS will produce regularly gridded daily wind fields. Oceanographers can use these fields to force their models with an exceptionally accurate wind forcing.
Dr. Mark Bourassa, a Research Associate at COAPS, was present for the June launch of QuikSCAT at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California.
For more information on QuikSCAT, see: http://winds.jpl.nasa.gov/.
Degrees Conferred
Spring 99
Tara L. Connelly (MS) Characterizing marine microbial ecology in the Arctic: The effects of temperature and ambient nutrient concentrations on community structure and activity (YAGER)
Summer 99
Glynnis Bugna (D) Stable carbon isotopes as evidence of petroleum BTEX degradation (CHANTON)
Robert Hetland (D) The dynamics of a loop current forced shelf break jet on the West Florida Shelf (HSUEH)
Yoo Yin Kim (D) Mass and salt budgets and saline water intrusions for a region of the continental shelf in the Southern Mid-Atlantic Bight (WEATHERLY)
Young-Heon Jo (MS) Experimental test of the linear stability analysis for salt fingers (KRISHNAMURTI)
Colin P. Murray (MS) Interannual variability of upper ocean vorticity balances in the Gulf of Alaska (O'BRIEN)
Anastasia Romanou (D) Bouyant Ekman Layers over variable topography (WEATHERLY)
More Awards for Department Members
Three department faculty members are winners of this year's FSU Professorial Excellence Program (PEP) and Teaching Incentive Program (TIP). FSU gave a total of 54 PEP and 74 TIP awards this year, which will provide a $5,000 increase to winners' base salaries. Dr. Allan Clarke, Dr. Nancy Marcus, and Dr. Doron Nof were selected as PEP recipiants, and Dr. Doron Nof was also presented with the TIP award.
These awards were based on excellence and high merit in scholarship or creative achievement, teaching, and service since the last promotion. Instructional quality measures such as peer and student evaluations were also considered for the TIP.
Dr. Guebuem Kim, a Research Assistant with Dr. Burnett, was awarded the Theodore Wolf Prize for the best dissertation of the year in the field of Physical and Life Sciences completed at the University of Delaware in May of this year. The title of his dissertation is "Atmospheric inputs and upper ocean biogeochemistry of trace elements and radionuclide tracers in the Atlantic." This award is one of the five university dissertation prizes, which compete among many departments. It comes with an amount of $1,000.
Travel
Dr. Bill Burnett and Dr. Jeff Chanton participated in a SCOR/LOICZ Working Group Meeting on submarine groundwater discharge to the coastal zone. The meeting was held in Birmingham, England, July 22-24, 1999. Plans were made at this meeting for a measurement intercalibration project to be held in Florida this November.
Dr. Jeff Chanton and his student, Lia Chasar, were invited speakers the XIV International Botanical Congress held August 1-7th 1999 in St. Louis, Missouri, which is held once every six years. Lia Chasar gave a seminar titled "Carbon dynamics in northern peatlands: new evidence for microbial respiration driven by recently fixed surficial DOC within 3000-5000 year old peat" for the symposium "Physiology and anatomy of roots in wetland environments." Dr. Chanton's seminar was titled "methane distributions as indicators of gas transport mechanisms in emergent aquatic plants," which he gave during the symposium "Ecological significance of internal aeration in wetlands: plant adaptation and geochemical control of the rhizosphere."
Dr. Alan Clarke presented a seminar at WHOI in July entitled "on the spring persistence barrier in ENSO." He has also been invited to be the key lecturer for the Fourth Australian Climate Research Graduate Summer School. This year the summer school will focus on the El Niño - Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon. What is it? What makes it tick? How successful are we in predicting it? What impact does it have to do with Australia and how can predictions be used to improve decision making on farms? The summer school is to be held at the Marine Science Center of Flinders University in Port Lincoln on the Eyre Penninsula from January 24 through February 4, 2000.
Dr. Ya Hsueh recently returned from a series of seminar giving around the globe. He gave the following seminars: "Why do rings form from western boundary currents?" on July 22, at the Department of Oceanography, University of Cape Town, South Africa; "Kuroshio eddies in the Luzon Strait" on July 29 at IUGG, Birmingham, UK; "A Possible Explanation of the South China Sea warm Current" and "Kuroshio and South China Sea circulation," a keynote speech at the Fourth Symposium on Marine Sciences of China Seas and Adjacent Sea Areas on August 4th.
In May, Dr. William Landing and his students Paulo Barrocas and John Perry attended the 5th International Conference on Mercury as a Global Pollutant in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Dr. Landing gave a presentation titled "long range transport of aerosol mercury, reactive gaseous mercury, and other chemical tracers across the Atlantic Ocean" (by William M. Landing, Jerome J. Perry Jr., Jane L. Guentzel, and Gary A. Gill). Dr. Landing will also be chairing a special symposium at the August 1999 American Chemical Society Annual Meeting in New Orleans later in August on "Geochemistry and bioavailability of nitrogen and phosphorus in dissolved organic compounds." He will give one talk titled "Speciation of dissolved organic phosphorus in the Florida Everglades."
Dr. Nancy Marcus attended the summer meeting of the Ocean Studies Board of the National Research Council in Woods Hole, MA on Aug 2-4, 1999. She will also be traveling to Tromso, Norway for the Transatlantic Study of Calanus - Special Symposium, August 24-27, where she will present a seminar titled "Sex ratio and sex switching in Calanus: environmental effects." The paper is a collaboration along with Pam Blades-Ekelbarger (Univ. of Maine) and Jennifer Crain (Oregon State University).
Dr. James O'Brien will give a presentation on oceans as drivers of climate variability in September at the U.S.-SINO Workshop: "Impacts of ocean variability on climate" to take place in China.
Dr. Lita Proctor and her student, Carl Childs, went on a research cruise to the Louisiana continental shelf this July, as a part of a DOE-sponsored project to study the molecular and geochemical regulation of denitrification in marine sediments (see photos in the field). Dr. Proctor has also been nominated to participate in a National Academy of Sciences-sponsored "Frontiers of Science" symposium, held annually in different host countries. This year's symposium will be held in Tsukuba, Japan on October 1-5, 1999. The symposia are designed to "bring together scientists to discuss not only their own fields of research but to learn about advances in other fields." This year, the symposium keynote speakers will include Bill Schopf, UCLA, who will speak on the Origin of Life and Kazuo Hirai, Honda Corporation, who will speak on Robotics.
Dr. Wilton Sturges participated in the Global Sea Level Observing System (GLOSS) Group of Experts' Sixth Meeting in Toulouse, France in May of this year for a workshop on 'Ocean circulation science derived from the Atlantic, Indian and Arctic Sea level networks' (which will result in an IOC Workshop Report). He was also a session chairman at the Gordon Conference in New Hampshire this year.
Dr. David Thistle gave an invited presentation titled "Is the deep sea a challenging environment for harpacticoids?" at the 7th International Conference on Copepoda, 25-31 July 1999, Curitiba,Brazil.
Dr. John Winchester participated in a global warming education event in Washington, DC, June 27-28 to help members of Congress with legislation concerning greenhouse gas emissions and climate change. The event was by invitation from the Union of Concerned Scientists Sound Science Initiative and included 53 scientists from 24 key states that are expected to be most severely impacted by global warming. Florida was represented by Dr. Winchester and three others who met as a group with aides of Senators Bob Graham and Connie Mack and Representatives Allen Boyd and Karen Thurman. After the event, Dr. Winchester was invited by WFSU-FM to discuss global warming on its hour-long call-in program Perspectives hosted by Ben Wilcox and Jackie Beam on July 22. A tape recording of the program is available for listening by those interested.
Web Technology Brings OCE1001 into the 21st Century
Dr. Lita Proctor has received a grant for student support and summer salary from the Office of Graduate Studies to create web-based courses for both OCE1001 Elementary Oceanography and OCE1001 Honors. The university is one of five beta-testing sites across the country for a new course development software called "CourseInfo" developed by Blackboard Inc.
With the help of Paige Leitman, a doctoral student in the department, Proctor is updating the current web-based material she has already developed for OCE1001 for use in the new program. She plans to use this new web-based material in the spring semester, when She will be teaching the Elementary Oceanography course as well as it's honors' section.
Around FSU, there are approximately 30 faculty who are participating in the beta-test. FSU already has implemented two other web-based programs, WebMC, which allows instructors to provide course information to students on-line, and the 2+2 Distance Learning Initiative providing a selection of bachelor's degree programs via the internet.
'CourseInfo' is a combination of such ideas, as it may be used as a distance learning tool or as a supplement for classes. The program will allow students to access the syllabus, assignment information, and special announcements, check their grade, drop off files for instructors, network with other students, and create their own web pages. They will also be able to use an interactive calendar of events that shows an exam schedule and allows the student to personalize their calendar with their own entries.
Using 'CourseInfo' instructors are able to track user activity, create project/lab user groups, and organize e-mail groups. The program includes a quiz generator, an online gradebook, and a course statistics page for instructor reference. The good news for faculty is that this program is completely gui, i.e. no knowledge of HTML is required. If implemented, 'CourseInfo' could help standardize FSU's web-based course information.
For more information:
Oceanography Day at the Capitol
Two expo events took department members to the Capitol this spring to present a departmental display highlighting research projects and other activities. The first of these events, FSU Day at the Capitol, was held on the first two levels of the new Capitol around the rotunda. About 35 FSU departments or institutions were represented by displays.
Oceanography Day at the Capitol, organized by the Florida Institute of Oceanography (http://www.marine.usf.edu/FIO), was held on the second floor of the Capitol. FIO is a consortium of universities and oceanographic institutions from around Florida. FIO helps promote and coordinate the state's oceanographic and marine programs and resources through public outreach, research facility support, and education.
This year's presentations were a first for both FSU and FIO, and both hope to make them annual events in order to advertise institutional achievements to the legislature and the public.
In the Field
On their cruise to the Louisiana continental shelf this July, Dr. Lita Proctor and Carl Childs took sediment samples at nine stations from the ocean floor with a box corer, along with surface and bottom water samples. The samples, taken from depths of ~6 m to 60 m, will be used to study the molecular and geochemical regulation of denitrification in marine sediments in a DOE-sponsored project. They performed four kinds of assays on the samples: measured denitrification potential, measured nitrogen fixation, preserved samples in formaldehyde for direct counts of bacterial population, and preserved samples in liquid nitrogen for extracting messenger RNA for the genes that are encoding nitrite reductase. The cruise, on the R/V Pelican, is part of an ongoing NSF-funded project to study the "Dead Zone," a vast and recurring region of hypoxia (i.e. no dissolved oxygen), which develops annually along the Mississippi River plume and into the Gulf of Mexico. The hypoxia appears to be driven by nutrient pollution-stimulated productivity, which leads to high rates of oxygen consumption. The nutrient pollution derives from agriculture along the Mississippi River watershed. Dr. Nancy Rabalais of LUMCON is chief scientist and the cruise includes participants from LUMCON, LSU, and Texas A&M. This year, the Dead Zone was larger than ever recorded.
R/V Pelican
Lowering Niskin bottles for water sampling
Kevin Dillon, a Ph.D. student with Dr. Chanton, uses a multilevel sampling device to sample for groundwater tracers and nutrients on St. George Island in a study funded by the Department of Health and NOAA's Graduate Fellowship for Estuarine Research Reserve. The research is designed to work on establishing the pathways and magnitudes of groundwater flow, associated nutrients, and bacteria into the Apalachicola Bay from small-scale domestic sewage systems in an effort to monitor the rapid growth costs of the area.
At a site in the Florida Keys, Reide Corbett, a Ph.D. candidate with Dr. Burnett, uses USGS equipment to drill through limestone to install a monitoring well. Using tracer testing, the study looks at the rate and direction of nutrients as they move away from shallow injection wells. The research is focused on determining whether current methods of human waste disposal, primarily shallow injection wells, are satisfactory and whether or not centralized sewerage sites need to be implemented throughout the Florida Keys. The EPA funds the research.
Sea levels are rising at the rate of about one-foot per century, a fact that has serious implications for Florida and a problem intrinsic to global climate change. Sea level rise prediction has been the focus of Dr. Sturges' research for some time. With the help of Dr. B.G. Hong (a recent graduate of the department), he has found an interesting correlation between wind data and sea level fluctuations. The figure above shows excellent results of sea level fluctuations observed at Lewes, Delaware, compared with the output of a model driven by winds over the Atlantic Ocean. The winds that force the model extend across the full width of the Atlantic form 180North to 38North.
Hong, B.G., W. Sturges and A.J.Clarke. Sea level on the US east coast: decadal variability caused by open-ocean wind forcing. Journal Physical Oceanography, in review.
Oceanography on the web
We are currently working on updating our web site to include a few new features. Soon you will be able to search the department web site for the specific information or person you are looking for. Alumni will also have their own page with information and links to sites of fellow alumni. We will also have a new look. So, point your browser to http://www.ocean.fsu.edu when you surf & check out the new developments.
Pin Reminders
Don't forget that department pins are your gift when you contribute to the department. Your support helps to improve department programs that continue to prepare students for the field of oceanography. For more information call (850) 644-2770 or e-mail moss@ocean.fsu.edu
In the Next Issue
Two new faculty members and an associate scholar/scientist join the department: Dr. Joel Kostka from the Skidaway Institute of Oceanography in Savannah, Georgia; Dr. Kevin Speer, from the Laboratoire de Physique des Oceans - IFREMER; and Dr. Sophie Wacogne from the University of Brest, France.
View from the Bridge
by David Thistle
Since I last wrote in March, the major event has been the award of the 1999 Lawton Distinguished Professorship to Jim O'Brien. The Lawton award is the highest honor the university gives a professor. It marks a career of outstanding scholarship and academic achievement. To have Jim win it is tremendously gratifying for the department. We are all looking forward to his Lawton address this fall.
Joel Kostka, the new "bridge" faculty member between biological oceanography and marine chemistry, will arrive any day. Jim Winne has been renovating his labs over the summer, and everything seems poised for him to unpack and continue his very productive research program. In fact, he already has been awarded his first FSU grant, even before he arrived!
More personally, I traveled to Washington D.C. to attend the wedding of my former masters-degree student Susan Boa. Susan has been using her degree in a variety of science advocacy jobs in the D.C. area. She is presently at SEAWEB trying to save the swordfish. The wedding was lovely and Susan was radiant. Several OCN alumni were in attendance (Steve Blackburn, Heidi Hertler, Bob Lutz, and Gary Schultz). It was great to hear their news and learn of their success.
Tallahassee, FL 32306-4320 | (850)644-6700
Back to Top | Contact Us | Comments & Questions | Privacy Policy | Copyright