Congratulations to this year's C-MORE Scholars who presented their work this month at C-MORE Hale. The day showcased the impressive work accomplished and accolades earned by this year's Scholars (including the Neuheimer Lab's Jennifer Wong-Ala). Best of luck in all your future endeavours, Scholars!
Lab member Jennifer Wong-Ala receives dual honours from NOAA!
C-MORE Scholar Jennifer Wong-Ala has been awarded two scholarships from the National Ocean and Atmospheric Association. Jenn will begin work with NOAA this summer through the 2015 Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center Young Scientist Opportunity. In addition, Jenn has been awarded a 2015 Ernest F. Hollings Scholarship to support her undergraduate studies and allow her further internship opportunities at NOAA. Congratulations Jenn!!
UH's 3rd Annual Conference of Biological Oceanography Graduate Students
This Thursday, 30 April, C-MORE will host UH's 3rd Annual Conference of Biological Oceanography Graduate Students. This student-run event will showcase current student research in biological oceanography at SOEST. All are welcome to attend!
Lab member Jenn Wong-Ala presents @ 2015 SACNAS Regional Meeting
C-MORE Scholar Jenn will be presenting her work in Costa Rica entitled "Stressed Out Streams: The Effects of Agriculture on Stream Nutrient Cycling" at the 2015 SACNAS Regional Meeting. (18 April, 09:00, University of Hawai'i at Mānoa Campus Center Ballroom)
Lab member Chantel Chang blogs "What drives me?"
MS Candidate Chantel Chang blogs about her grad school motivation over at the SOEST blog.
Check it out here.
Spawning phenology work presented this week @ PICES, Brazil
We will be presenting our recently published work explaining fish spawning phenology, along with more recent explorations on the implications of spawning time for population production at the PICES 3rd Climate Change Symposium in Santos City, Brazil.
Co-author Dr. Mark Payne will be leading the presentation in Session 6 (Rooms Diamante 5-6) from 17:20-17:40 on Mon. 23 March:
The roles of plasticity and adaptation in spawning time of Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua): explaining phenology and making predictions in a changing climate.
Anna B. Neuheimer, Mark R. Payne and Brian R. MacKenzie
Spawning time is thought to evolve to allow offspring to overlap in time and space with beneficial conditions for growth, development and survival. Mismatch between larval timing and e.g. food may result in high larval mortality and reduced productivity. The degree of mismatch will depend on the differing climate responses of predator and prey species, including potential mitigative mechanisms such as adaptation or distribution shifts. Thus, a species’ production will depend on its capacity to tolerate and/or adapt to environmental conditions relative to other species in the environment. Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua) populations exhibit remarkably similar life histories despite spanning wide ranges in latitude (40 to 80°N) and climate (e.g. -1 to 20°C). In previous work, we demonstrated that temperature-standardized spawning time (i.e. the thermal constant of spawning) shows systematic and parallel declines with increasing latitude for populations on both sides of the Atlantic (Neuheimer & MacKenzie, 2014, Ecology). Here we explore these patterns as evidence of adaptation (i.e. countergradient variation) to growing season timing by comparing estimates of first-feeder- and prey-timing proxies for populations across the species’ range. We discuss the implications of our results for trends in spawning time, match-mismatch and resulting production both in the past and future.
Lab Member Jenn @ 2015 Emerging Researchers Conference #ERN2015
Jenn Wong-Ala heads to Washington, DC this week to present at the 2015 Emerging Researchers National Conference in Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics. Jenn will be presenting results from field work in Costa Rica entitled "Stressed Out Streams: The Effects of Agriculture on Stream Nutrient Cycling". Safe travels Jenn!
New Article: Explaining life history variation in a changing climate across a species’ range
New article out in Ecology!
Neuheimer Lab @ Arctic Change 2014
Anna will be presenting recent work on fish spawning time at the Arctic Change 2014 conference in Ottawa this week. Check out the exciting Arctic research line-up here.
Lab-member Jenn heads to the Annual SACNAS Conference
Lab-member Jenn Wong-Ala heads to L.A. for the Annual SACNAS Conference. Jenn will present her poster "What is stressing our streams?" (#618) on Saturday (18/10) from 9:30-11:30.
SAT-618
WHAT IS STRESSING OUT OUR STREAMS?
Jennifer Wong-Ala1, Aaron Stoler2.
1College of Arts and Sciences, Kapi`olani Community College, Honolulu, HI, 2Oakland University, Rochester, MI.
The conversion of forest into other uses such as agriculture is known to cause harmful effects to streams in the surrounding area, including increased water temperature and changes in organic matter inputs (e.g., woody debris). This study sought to assess the independent and interactive effects of organic matter input on ecosystem processes such as primary productivity in a tropical montane stream system. We hypothesized that changes in woody debris inputs associated with agricultural activity would increase rates of ecosystem processes, particularly primary productivity. To test this hypothesis, we conducted a controlled experiment using streamside flow-through mesocosms within the secondary forest of the Las Cruces Biological Station in San Vito, Costa Rica. Our mesocosm experiment contained 8 flow-through channels. Treatments consisted of either rock substrate or rock, leaf litter, and woody-debris substrate. These treatments simulated agricultural and forested stream substrates, respectively. We then estimated primary productivity by measuring algal biomass within each mesocosm once a week for a total of 2 weeks. We expect that decreases in organic matter inputs increase primary productivity, which in turn increased the algal biomass.
Neuheimer Lab @ Hjort Symposium
Our work on the adaptive significance of life history timing in Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua) was presented today at the Hjort Symposium in Bergen, Norway by colleague and co-author Dr. Mark Payne (DTU Aqua).
Neuheimer Lab @ Sea - Cruise to Station ALOHA
Tomorrow, Anna heads out with members of UH's Deep-Sea Fish Ecology Lab for a 13-day cruise around Station ALOHA. A main purpose of the trip aboard R/V Kilo Moana will be gathering samples to estimate trophic interactions in the pelagic food-web of the north Pacific subtropical gyre.
Lab welcomes C-MORE Scholar - Jennifer Wong-Ala
The Neuheimer lab welcomes C-MORE Scholar Jennifer Wong-Ala! Jenn will be joining our lab to explore connectivity of Lau'ipala (yellow tang, Zebrasoma flavescens) populations around Hawaii Island. Find out more about the C-MORE Scholar program here.
Lab welcomes new grad student - Marie Ferguson
This month the Neuheimer Lab welcomes Marie Ferguson. Marie joins the lab via NOAA CRED to pursue a MS in Oceanography with a focus on coral reef growth and distribution. Welcome Marie!
Lab-member Chantel writes about her path to oceanography
Check out Chantel Chang's post over at the SOEST student blog:
She details her adventures switching careers and joining the Maile Mentoring Bridge program. Nice read Chantel!
Neuheimer Lab @ Sea - Happy sailing Chantel!
Wishing everyone on board the RV Falkor (including Neuheimer Lab member Chantel Chang) safe sailing, fair winds and following seas as they head out to explore the copepod community at Station Aloha for the 3rd Schmidt Ocean Institute student cruise. Find out more about the cruise here, including the student blog.
A month @ CMEC, Denmark
Anna is spending the month with the good folks at the Center for Macroecology, Evolution & Climate (University of Copenhagen) collaborating with Brian MacKenzie on the ecology of early fish life history.
UHM's 2nd Annual Conference of Biological Oceanography Graduate Students
Join us for UHM’s 2nd Annual Conference of Biological Oceanography Graduate Students (CBOGS)!
Date: Wednesday, 30 April
Time: 8:30 – 16:00
Place: C-MORE Hale Moore Conference Center, 1950 East-West Road
This one-day, student-led conference will showcase current SOEST research in biological oceanography via 15-minute presentations by our grad students. It’s a great opportunity to learn about work ongoing in our division, and one that we hope will promote communication, camaraderie and collaboration within the department, SOEST, UHM and beyond.
Neuheimer Lab @ Ocean Sciences #2014OSM
Safe travels to all those joining us for Ocean Sciences! http://www.sgmeet.com/osm2014/default.asp
Come check out our presentations:
PATTERNS OF ADULT AND PROGENY SIZE IN THE OCEAN: FROM ROTIFERS TO WHALES. A.B. Neuheimer, M. Hartvig, J. Heuschele, S. Hylander, T. Kiørboe, K. H. Olsson, J. Sainmont, & K.H. Andersen.
Session #:022
Date: 2/24/2014
Time: 14:45
Location: 316 A
THE ABUNDANCE AND DISTRIBUTION OF MACROBENTHIC ORGANISMS AT MESOPHOTIC CORAL REEF ECOSTYSTEMS IN THE NORTHWESTERN HAWAIIAN ISLANDS. Chang, C., Wagner, D., Kosaki, R. K.
Session #:011
Date: 2/27/2014
Time: 16:00 - 18:00
Location: Poster/Exhibit Hall
EXAMINING THE HAWAIIAN PELAGIC FOOD WEB FROM THE EPIPELAGIC TO THE MESOPELAGIC USING FATTY ACID BIOMARKERS. Drazen, J. C., Choy, C. A., Neuheimer, A.B., Phleger, C. F., Nichols, P. D.
Session #:098
Date: 2/24/2014
Time: 16:00 - 18:00
Location: Poster/Exhibit Hall
Lab welcomes new graduate student - Chantel Chang
Beginning January, Chantel Chang has joined the Neuheimer Lab. Chantel will be pursuing a Masters degree exploring biophysical modelling of wide-ranging holoplankton. Welcome Chantel!
