Press Room
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) Director and President Robert Gagosian and Senior Scientist John Whitehead of the Physical Oceanography Department were recently elected Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, one of the oldest learned societies in the nation. Drs. Gagosian and Whitehead are among the 177 Fellows and 30 Foreign Honorary Members elected to the 2002 Class, which includes a United States Senator and a Representative, four college presidents, three Nobel Prize winners, six Pulitzer Prize winners, three MacArthur Fellows and six Guggenheim Fellows.
In 1977, scientists made a stunning discovery on the bottom of the Pacific Ocean that forever changed our understanding of our planet and life on it. They discovered the first deep-sea hydrothermal vents, andA?to their complete surpriseA?a lush community of exotic life thriving around them.
A local scientist has been honored by the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences with its highest honors. Scientist Emeritus John Hunt of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution was awarded the Gold Medal of Honor of Albert Einstein by the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, United States section, for “outstanding contributions in the field of geology.” The medal is the highest award conferred by the Academy.
After a long and extensive search process, the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) has appointed Carolyn A. Bunker of Falmouth Vice President for Finance and Administration and Chief Financial Officer. The appointment, announced today by WHOI Director and President Robert Gagosian, is effective immediately.
The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) and Gladding-Hearn Shipbuilding, Duclos Corporation of Somerset, MA, signed a contract today to build a 60-foot vessel to replace the Institution’s aging 46-foot coastal vessel Asterias. Construction of the new vessel is estimated at a cost of $1.6 million, with delivery expected in March 2004.
The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) will present one of its highest honors, the Mary Sears Woman Pioneer in Oceanography Award, to California Biologist Mary Wilcox Silver. A Professor of Ocean Sciences at the University of California, Santa Cruz, Dr. Silver is being honored for providing “significant scientific leadership in understanding our marine environment” and recognized for providing “the inspiration and/or opportunity for other women in marine sciences.” Colleagues note that she has “led the way for people with strong family commitments to go to sea, showing that scientists could combine challenging, field-based careers with family life.”
The Falmouth-based landscape architectural firm Stephen Stimson Associates Landscape Architects is receiving a prestigious award for work on the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution’s new Quissett Campus master plan.
Nelson Hogg, a senior scientist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), will receive the 2002 Stommel Award from the American Meteorological Society (AMS) January 16 during the society’s 82nd annual meeting in Orlando, FL. AMS is the nation’s leading professional society for scientists in the atmospheric and related sciences.
Farming practices in the Mississippi River drainage area are affecting coastal ocean waters off Louisiana and the coastal water quality in the Gulf of Mexico. Dr. Nancy Rabalais of the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium, a leading researcher in this field, will share some of her findings when she receives the 12th Bostwick H. Ketchum Award January 16 at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI).
Scientists from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) report in today’s issue of the journal Nature that the population growth rate of North Atlantic Right whales has declined below replacement level because of increased mortality rates of mothers. The population numbers only about 300 and is predicted to become extinct within 200 years if the environmental conditions experienced by the whales in 1995 were maintained.
Two scientists have been recognized by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) for their contributions to ocean sciences research. Drs. Daniel J. Fornari of the Geology and Geophysics Department and Rui Xin Huang of the Physical Oceanography Department have been named recipients of a W. Van Alan Clark Chair for Excellence in Oceanography at the Institution. Each endowed chair brings financial support for a period of five years, allowing the recipient the freedom to pursue a variety of career interests. The awards were announced today during the Institution’s fall meeting of the Board of Trustees and Members of the Corporation and are effective January 1, 2002.
Students from Canada, Slovakia, South Africa, and Trinidad and Tobago are spending two weeks at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) participating in a research camp focused on coastal environmental research. The students won an international competition to participate in the camp, the first held in the United States.
When the new U.S. Coast Guard icebreaker HEALY departs Tromso, Norway, July 31 for a two-month cruise across the Arctic Ocean, scientists won’t be studying the ice cap but the seafloor far below. Their focus will be the Gakkel Ridge, three miles beneath the ocean surface, the slowest spreading ridge on earth. It is a window into the earth’s interior scientists hope will help fill a gap in their knowledge of how the earth’s crust forms.
Scientists and engineers at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) and their colleagues will use a new digital recording tag to study and assess the risk factors of vessel collisions with the endangered Northern right whale. Less than 300 of the whales remain.
Associate Director for Education, Dean of Graduate Studies and Senior Scientist John Farrington of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution has been invited to testify July 19 before a Congressional committee on strategies to address sediments contaminated with PCBs and other toxic chemicals. The hearing, before the Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment of the U.S. House of Representatives’ Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, will begin at 9:30 a.m. in. in Room 2167 of the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, DC.
Senior Scientist Robert Weller will testify July 12 before a joint Congressional hearing on ocean exploration and the development and implementation of coastal and ocean observing systems. The hearing will start at 1 p.m. in Room 2318 of the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, DC.
Citing assistance with a number of highly visible projects and a productive long-term relationship, RADM George Naccara of the U.S. Coast Guard presented the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) with its Public Service Commendation April 24, 2001, during dockside ceremonies at the Group Woods Hole facility. WHOI Director Robert Gagosian and Associate Director For Marine Operations Richard Pittenger accepted the award on behalf of the Institution.
For nearly 25 years, scientists have wondered how giant red-tipped tubeworms and other exotic marine life found at hydrothermal vents on the deep sea floor get from place to place and how long their larva survive in a cold, eternally dark place. Now Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Biologist Lauren Mullineaux and colleagues have helped answer those questions.
Two web sites developed by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) are among the 135 sites nominated in more than two dozen categories for the 5th Annual Webby Awards, called by some A?the Oscars of the Internet.A? The 2001 awards will be presented by The International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences July 18 at a ceremony at San FranciscoA?s War Memorial Opera House.
As weather warms in New England and we dream of summer days, a team of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) scientists has headed south to the frigid waters around Antarctica for the first of a series of international cruises to study the distribution and behavior of krill – the major food source for most animals in the Southern Ocean. The eight-member WHOI team is using a variety of new technologies including a remotely operated vehicle to study the small shrimp-like crustaceans that form the base of the food chain for whales, penguins, seals and other marine life.