Ocean Studies Board

Claudia Benitez-Nelson

Claudia Benitez-Nelson (Chair) is the Associate Dean Associate Dean for Instruction, Community Engagement, & Research and Carolina Distinguished Professor & Endowed Chair in Marine Studies in the College of Arts & Sciences at the University of South Carolina. As an Associate Dean, Dr. Benitez-Nelson has direct oversight of five departments (Biological Sciences, Mathematics, School of the Earth, Ocean & Environment, Psychology, and Statistics) that encompass over 300 faculty and staff, 300 graduate students, and over 2500 undergraduate majors. Dr. Benitez-Nelson’s research focuses on the biogeochemical cycling of phosphorus and carbon and how these elements are influenced by both natural and anthropogenic processes. She is a diverse scientist, with expertise ranging from radiochemistry to harmful algal bloom toxins and is highly regarded for her cross-disciplinary research. Over the past two decades, Dr. Benitez-Nelson has authored or co-authored more than 100 articles, including lead author publications in the journals Science and Nature. She has been continuously supported by substantial, multi-year research and education grants from the National Science Foundation and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, among others. Her many research honors include the Early Career Award in Oceanography from AGU and Fulbright and Marie Curie Fellowships. In 2015 she was named an AAAS Fellow, and in 2017, was named an ASLO Sustaining Fellow. Dr. Benitez-Nelson is also highly regarded as a teacher and mentor, having received the National Faculty of the Year Award from the National Society of Collegiate Scholars and the University of South Carolina’s Distinguished Professor of the Year Award, SEC Faculty Achievement Award, and Outstanding Faculty Advisor of the Year. In 2014, she received the Sulzman Award for Excellence in Education and Mentoring from the Biogeosciences Section of AGU. Dr. Benitez-Nelson is regularly called upon by national and international scientific and policy agencies for her expertise and currently serves or has served as a member of the Advisory Committee to the Geoscience Directorate of NSF, the EPA Science Advisory Board, and the National Academy of Science’s Ocean Studies Board. Dr. Benitez-Nelson earned a B.S. in chemistry and oceanography from the University of Washington and a Ph.D. in oceanography from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute/Massachusetts Institute of Technology Joint Program in 1999.

Mark R. Abbott

Mark Abbott was the tenth Director and President of WHOI and now serves as President Emeritus. Previously, he was dean of the College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences (CEOAS) at Oregon State University. His research focuses on the interaction of biological and physical processes in the upper ocean and relies on both remote sensing and field observations. He is a pioneer in the use of satellite ocean color data to study coupled physical/biological processes. He has deployed a wide variety of ocean color sensors in the upper ocean, including moored arrays at the Polar Front in the Southern Ocean and ocean drifters in the California Current as well as the Polar Front. Dr. Abbott served as principal investigator on a grant from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation that formulated a new vision for the design, development, and deployment of ocean sensors, one that takes its cues from the small, agile startup businesses and creative “maker spaces” that have sought to disrupt conventional approaches to technology development. He has also advised the Office of Naval Research and the National Science Foundation on issues regarding advanced computer technology and oceanography. In addition to being a member of the Ocean Studies Board, he has served as chair of the Committee on Earth Science and Applications from Space, and member of the Committee on Future Directions for NSF Advanced Computing Infrastructure to Support US Science. He was a member of the National Science Board and served as president of The Oceanography Society. In 2011, he received the Jim Gray eScience Award from Microsoft Research.

Rosanna 'Anolani Alegado

Rosie 'Anolani Alegado is an Associate Professor of Oceanography and Sea Grant in the School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology (SOEST) at the University of Hawai'i Manoa. She serves as the director of Sea Grant Ulana 'Ike Center of Excellence and the director of the SOEST Maile Mentoring Bridge, a near-peer mentoring program for students transitioning from Hawai'i community colleges to UH Manoa. Alegado is a microbial oceanographer in the Daniel K. Inouye Center for Microbial Oceanography: Research and Education who uses model systems and field experiments to investigate how ecology informs evolution of microbes and their symbioses. Her work focuses on how microbial interactions may have large-scale consequences for ecosystem resilience: (1) the influence of microbes on animal origins, development and homeostasis; (2) drivers of microbial diversity and community structure in subtropical estuaries. Alegado’s research program is rooted in meaningful academic collaborations and partnerships with indigenous communities. She is committed to training the next generation of scholars to draw upon multiple knowledge systems in order to address key problems and to empower communities to understand and protect their resources. Alegado earned a Bachelor’s of Science in Biology and a Minor in Toxicology and Environmental Health from MIT, a PhD in Microbiology and Immunology from Stanford University School of Medicine, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship in evolutionary biology with Nicole King at UC Berkeley.

Lionel A. Arteaga-Quintero

Lionel Arteaga is an oceanographer and Earth scientist at the Global Modeling and Assimilation Office in the NASA Goddard Flight Space Center. His research focuses on quantifying and understanding global biogeochemical cycles using ecological models and satellite observations in support of NASA’s EXPORTS program and PACE mission. Prior to joining NASA, Dr. Arteaga was a Postdoctoral Fellow at Princeton University working on the quantification of Southern Ocean carbon fluxes within the Southern Ocean Carbon and Climate Observations and Modeling (SOCCOM) project. Arteaga has been awarded several NASA grants as a Principal Investigator (PI) aimed at quantifying Antarctic air-sea carbon fluxes and assessing the impact of marine heatwaves on the biological carbon pump. Arteaga graduated as a biologist from Universidad Simón Bolívar, Venezuela, and continued his studies in oceanography and biogeochemical modeling in Germany and Australia, and received his MS and PhD from the GEOMAR | Helmholtz Center for Ocean Research Kiel, where he was awarded the Prof. Dr. Werner Petersen-Stifung prize for outstanding doctoral thesis in 2015.

Amy S. Bower

Amy Bower is a Senior Scientist in the Physical Oceanography Department at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts. She earned a B.S. in Physics in 1981 from Tufts University and a Ph.D. in Oceanography from the University of Rhode Island in 1988. Amy is an elected Fellow of the American Meteorological Society, and a member of the American Geophysical Union, the European Geosciences Union, and Sigma Xi. She was awarded the 2025 Henry Stommel Research Medal by the American Meteorological Society for “forging understanding of the ocean’s circulation, dynamics of deep flow pathways, and the meridional overturning circulation. Along with her colleagues, students and post-docs, Amy studies the pathways of deep ocean circulation as well as the formation, evolution and decay of ocean eddies using observed and simulated water parcel trajectories. Most recently, she has been a co-PI in the Overturning in the Subpolar North Atlantic Program, a decade-long international effort to observe large-scale, climate-relevant circulation patterns. Visually impaired since graduate school, Amy works as an advocate for improved accessibility to STEM education and careers for all.

Lisa M. Campbell

Lisa Campbell is a professor of marine affairs and policy at Duke University. Her research focuses on policies and projects designed to reconcile wildlife (and other resource) conservation with socio-economic development, primarily in rural areas of developing countries. She studies the process of policy making, the transition from policy to practice, and the impacts of (and responses to) implementation at the local level. At the policy making stage, she examines how the interaction of science and other values, and how negotiations between stakeholders (local people, bilateral agencies, NGOs, and 'experts') inform the process. Specific policies include participatory development, community based conservation, sustainable use, and ecotourism. A major research focus has been on marine turtle conservation policy, and its implementation in Latin America and the Caribbean. Dr. Campbell is more generally interested in research methodology, including qualitative methods, inter-disciplinary research, and ethics.

Daniel Costa

Daniel Costa is the Director of the Institute of Marine Sciences and Distinguished Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of California at Santa Cruz. Daniel Costa completed a B.A. at UCLA and a Ph.D. at U.C. Santa Cruz followed by postdoctoral research at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. His research focuses on the ecology and physiology of marine mammals and seabirds, taking him to every continent and almost every habitat from the Galapagos to Antarctica. He has worked with a broad range of animals including turtles, penguins’ albatross, seals, sea lions, sirenians, whales and dolphins and has published over 400 scientific papers. His current work is aimed at recording the movement and distribution patterns of marine mammals and seabirds in an effort to understand their habitat needs. This work is helping to identify biodiversity hotspots and that factors that create them. He has been developing tools to identify and create viable Marine Protected Areas for the conservation of highly migratory species. In addition his research is studying the response of marine mammals to underwater sounds and developing ways to assess whether the potential disturbance may result in a population consequence. He has been very active in graduate education having supervised 22 masters and 30 doctoral students as well as 15 post-doctoral scholars. With Barbara Block he co-founded the Tagging of Pacific Predators program, a multidisciplinary effort to study the movement patterns of 23 species of marine vertebrate predators in the North Pacific Ocean. He is an internationally recognized authority on tracking of marine mammals and birds. He has served as member of a number of international science steering committees including the Integrated Climate and Ecosystem Dynamics program, The Census of Marine Life, Southern Ocean GLOBEC, CLIOTOP, the Southern Ocean Observing System (SOOS) and the Integrated Marine Biogeochemistry and Ecosystem Research (IMBER).

John R. Delaney

John Delaney is Professor Emeritus in Oceanography at the University of Washington. Early career experiences involved working as an economic geologist, across the western US, searching for base and precious metal deposits, and living for six months on and within multiple Galapagos Volcanoes in the early 1970’s. With blessings of the NAS Ocean Studies Board in1987, Delaney initiated the NSF-sponsored RIDGE Program by working with many colleagues to focus on Mid-Ocean Ridge (MOR) Systems, from the perspective of the feedback loops involving physical, chemical, and biological processes exposed within highly dynamic volcano-hydrothermal systems on the seafloor. RIDGE quickly expanded into “Inter-RIDGE” (international), which
continues today, and is being managed by the French at this time. Having made many tens of dives with the deep submersible ALVIN, and with nearly 50 sea-going expeditions, Delaney, again working with colleagues, helped launch an effort focused on gaining long-term, sustained access to myriad processes operating on, below, and above the seafloor off the coasts of Washington and Oregon. This effort involved implementing a tectonic-plate-scale installation of a submarine, electro-optically cabled network of sensors across the Juan de Fuca Plate as part of the NSF-Ocean Observatory Initiative. As of 2020, that Cabled Array has been operating for half a decade and provides continuous real-time data and information, to researchers and educators alike about many processes operating both along the JdF Ridge, and within the Cascadia Subduction Zone. It is also documenting a host of water-column processes off-shore. An important future use of this system will be to capture, for the first time-in real-time, the entire process of a MOR eruption using the cable-power to operate and interactive with, remote “Resident” Autonomous Undersea Vehicles at the seafloor and in the overlying ocean. In addition to studying the linkages among volcanoes and life here on Earth, Delaney has also been interested in the search for life elsewhere in the solar system. He worked with NASA-JPL to help plan space missions to the moons of Jupiter. He is a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union and recipient of AGU’s Athelstan Spilhaus Award for fostering public engagement by conveying to the general public the excitement, significance, and beauty of Earth and Space science. A late-stage focus of Delaney’s career has become the “Global Ocean-Human Culture” array of themes involving public elaboration of the broad, interlinked spectrum of ways that human societies have used, or been impacted by, oceans for tens of millennia, and how we may be impacted for centuries to come. The goal is to fundamentally expand public awareness about how crucial the ocean-systems are to the long-term well-being of all humanity from environmental, economic, security, discovery perspectives.

Scott Glenn

Scott Glenn is a Distinguished Professor in the Department of Marine and Coastal Sciences at Rutgers University and Co-Director of the Center for Ocean Observing Leadership. Dr. Glenn graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Joint Program in 1983 with a ScD in ocean engineering. His 35+ year research career of developing and implementing sustained real-time ocean observation and forecast systems began with support for offshore oil exploration at Shell Development Company (1983-1986), moved to supporting submarine fleet operations for the Naval Oceanography Command while at Harvard University (1986-1990), and, at Rutgers (since 1990), he has been a PI or co-PI on over $140M in research and application projects for NOAA, NSF, Navy, the National Academies, and the offshore energy industry. His research interests include the development of new autonomous ocean observing technologies, their application to scientific research in remote and extreme environments, and the development of a workforce to support broader global participation in ocean observing. A major focal point has been improving our scientific understanding and our ability to operationally forecast rapid co-evolution of the ocean, atmosphere and seabed in hurricanes and typhoons. Dr. Glenn is a Fellow in the Marine Technology Society and received the international Society for Underwater Technology’s Oceanography Award as well as the Carnegie/CASE U.S. Professors of the Year award for New Jersey. He served as Chair of the U.S. Committee for the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC). He is a member of the NOAA Science Advisory Board’s (SAB) Environmental Information Services Working Group (EISWG) responsible for advising NOAA on implementation of the Weather Act.

Marcia Isakson

Marcia Isakson is the Director of Strategic Programs and a Research Scientist at the Applied Research Laboratories at The University of Texas at Austin (ARL:UT). Dr. Isakson received her B.S. in engineering physics and mathematics from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1992. Upon graduation, she was awarded a Hertz Foundation Fellowship and completed a master’s degree in physics from the University of Texas at Austin in 1994. CPT Isakson served in the United States Army from 1994-1997 at Fort Hood, Texas. She earned a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Texas at Austin in 2002. She has been employed at ARL:UT since 2001 and has served as the principal investigator on over 21 sponsored projects working with the Office of Naval Research, the Naval Oceanographic Office, and ExxonMobil. She is a key principal investigator for ONR’s Task Force Ocean initiative working directly with the operational Navy. Her research interests include littoral acoustic propagation, autonomous underwater vehicles, high-frequency sonar and high-fidelity acoustic modeling. She has extensive experience with at-sea experiments, both foreign and domestic. Dr. Isakson has taught underwater acoustics at the University of Texas since 2009. She is a former president and fellow of the Acoustical Society of America (ASA) and a Distinguished Lecturer of the IEEE Oceanic Engineering Society. Dr. Isakson currently serves on the governing board of the American Institute of Physics (AIP).

Lekelia Jenkins

Lekelia “Kiki” Jenkins is a native of Baltimore, Maryland, where she grew up fishing and crabbing recreationally on the Chesapeake Bay. During the summers she prowled the grounds of the Baltimore Zoo as a junior zookeeper, learning about endangered species and conservation. A Meyerhoff Scholar and UNCF/Merck Fellow, she graduated with a B.S. in Biology and Dance Minor from the University of Maryland Baltimore County. As a National Science Foundation Graduate Fellow, Kiki received her PhD from Duke University by pioneering a new field of study into the invention and adoption of marine conservation technology. Later, she lobbied and gained the support of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to host its first ever AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellows. As a Fellow, she served in the National Marine Fisheries Service’s Office of International Affairs, where she helped implement new regulations to address bycatch and illegal, unregulated, and unreported (IUU) fishing by foreign nations. As a postdoctoral scholar at the University of Washington (UW) she was supported by the Ford Foundation Diversity Postdoctoral Fellowship and the David H. Smith Conservation Research Fellowship, which is awarded to rising conservation scientists who have the potential to change the face of conservation through entrepreneurial approaches. She later became an assistant professor at the School of Marine and Environmental Affairs at UW and during this time was awarded an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship in Ocean Sciences. She is now an associate professor at Arizona State University in the School for the Future of Innovation in Society and has recently been named an AAAS IF/THEN Ambassador and appointed to the National Academies of Sciences Ocean Studies Board.

Kiki’s research interests center on the rigorous, empirical study of the process of conservation in order to distill conservation theory and codify best practices, specifically exploring marine conservation, bycatch, fisheries, conservation technology, tidal energy, invention, technology transfer, and diffusion of innovations. Her research includes field sites along the southeast and west coasts of the United States, along Gulf of Mexico, in Ecuador, and in Costa Rica. Kiki is currently expanding her research into role of science dance in science education, science communication, and social change. Her pastimes include watching teaching and participating in all forms of dance, mentoring, reading, traveling, eating good food while enjoying a nice view, imagining the possibilities, loving her friends and family, and loving her life.

Lisa A. Levin

Lisa A. Levin is a Distinguished Professor Emerita at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego and former Director of the Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation. Levin is a biological oceanographer who studies benthic ecosystems in the deep sea and shallow water, with emphasis on effects of environmental change and direct human impacts. Levin received her B.A. from Radcliffe College and earned her Ph.D. at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego. She was a postdoctoral fellow at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and then spent 9 years as a professor in the Dept. of Marine, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at North Carolina State University. She joined the Scripps faculty in 1992 and retired in 2022, but remains an active researcher. She is a co-founder and co-lead of the Deep Ocean Stewardship Initiative, has helped establish the Deep Ocean Observing Strategy, and has contributed to IPCC reports (AR5, AR6, SROCC) and the World Ocean Assessments (I, II, III). Additional past contributions include steering committee membership for the Census of Marine Life programs on chemosynthetic ecosystems (ChESS) and continental margins (CoMARGE), the US Ocean Carbon Biochemistry Program, membership on the BOEM scientific advisory committee for the US Outer Continental Shelf environmental studies board, and in working groups of the US National Academy of Sciences, SCOR, SCOPE, NCEAS, and INDEEP. L. Levin is a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union and the Association of AAAS, has received lifetime achievement awards from the Am. Soc. Limnology and Oceanography and Western Soc. Naturalists and was awarded the Prince Albert I Grand Medal in Ocean Science. She is a member of the National Academy of Sciences.

Justin E. Manley

Justin Manley is an innovative technologist and executive with experience in startup, public corporation, academic, and public sectors. Mr. Manley has been working with marine technology and robotics since 1990. After professional roles at MIT, supporting NOAA and in the private sector Mr. Manley founded Just Innovation Inc. in 2015. He supports a variety of clients with a focus on uncrewed and undersea systems. He is an advisor to Terradepth, an ocean data services startup, and a co-founder of Seahawk Robotics which is commercializing drones that fly, float, deploy payloads and dive. This entreprenurial experience is shared with other startups through his work as a Venture Partner at AiiM Partners, a climate impact fund. Mr. Manley is extensively involved in the marine technology profession through a variety of leadership roles. He is a Senior Member of IEEE, a Life Member and Past-President of the Marine Technology Society (MTS), a Fellow of the Institute for Marine Engineering Science and Technology (IMAREST) and a founding member of Marine Education for Inspiration and Innovation (MATEII). He is dedicated to innovation, serving as a mentor to many startup companies and a judge for several XPRIZEs. He holds two patents in uncrewed systems oversight and security.

Galen McKinley

Galen A. McKinley is Professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences Columbia University and the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory. Professor McKinley is an ocean, carbon cycle and climate scientist whose research focuses on the physical, chemical and ecological drivers of the ocean’s anthropogenic carbon sink. She works across scales from global to North Atlantic to the Great Lakes. Her research tools include ocean and climate modeling and machine learning. In 2020, she received the Ocean Science Voyager from the American Geophysical Union. Professor McKinley earned a BS in Civil Engineering from Rice University, and a PhD in Climate Physics and Chemistry from MIT.

David Millar

David Millar is Fugro’s Government Accounts Director for the Americas region and previously ran a Fugro ocean and coastal mapping company based in San Diego, California. In his current role, he leads Fugro’s government affairs and serves as Fugro’s key account manager for national governments within the Americas, as well as the United Nations, the World Bank, and Inter-American Development Bank. Mr. Millar is responsible for overseeing the development and execution of Fugro’s partnerships with public sector clients and overseeing Fugro’s collaborative science activities within the Americas Region. He also directs Fugro’s global support of and participation in Seabed 2030, the United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development, and the Ocean Stewardship Coalition of the UN Global Compact. Mr. Millar is also a member of the GEBCO Guiding Committee, the International Hydrographic Organization’s Crowdsourced Bathymetry Working Group, and NOAA’s Ocean Exploration Advisory Board. Educated in Canada, he received a Bachelor of Science in Math and Physics from Mount Allison University and a Bachelor of Science in Engineering (Surveying) from the University of New Brunswick.

Laura Morton

Laura is a partner in the Washington, D.C. office of Perkins Coie. She draws on over 20 years of high-level government and private practice experience in her counsel on all stages of major offshore wind project development. Laura previously served as the Senior Director for Offshore Wind at the American Clean Power Association, where her portfolio included a wide range of issues surrounding the leasing and permitting process and multiple-use compatibility in the ocean environment, including fisheries, navigation, marine species, and transmission. Laura also worked with ACP members to develop strategies to elevate issues surrounding environmental justice and delivery of benefits to underserved communities. Prior to joining ACP, Laura served as acting Deputy Chief of Staff and Senior Advisor to the Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Her work encompassed a wide range of issues spanning water resources and data, fisheries, offshore energy, and aquaculture permitting. Earlier in her career, Laura was Senior Advisor in the Office of the U.S. Secretary of Energy, and Deputy Associate Director for Energy and Climate Change at the Council for Environmental Quality. While at the Department of Energy, Laura served as the agency’s representative on interagency offshore energy task forces, the National Ocean Council, and the President’s Task Force on Puerto Rico’s Status. Laura currently serves as an adjunct professorial lecturer in law at George Washington University School of Law, where she teaches a seminar on offshore wind planning and development. She received her JD cum laude in 1994 from the George Washington University Law School, her M.Sc. in European Studies in 1989 from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and her B.A. with highest honors in 1988 from the University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill.

Dean H. Roemmich

Dean Roemmich was Distinguished Professor of Oceanography at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UCSD, until his 2019 retirement and part-time Return to Active Duty at Scripps/UCSD. His expertise is in observations of large-scale ocean circulation. He was one of the founders of the Argo Program, a component of the Global Ocean Observing System. Roemmich received his bachelor’s degree in Physics in 1970 from Swarthmore College. He was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Tonga and Fiji from 1971 to 1974. He received his PhD in Oceanography from the MIT/WHOI Joint Program in 1980 and following a post-doctoral appointment at WHOI, he joined Scripps in 1981. His professional recognitions include the American Meteorological Society’s Sverdrup Gold Medal in 2008 “For major contributions to the measurement and understanding of the ocean’s role in climate”. In 2010 Roemmich was named a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union. In 2018, he was selected for the Alexander Agassiz Medal of the National Academy of Sciences (“For his ground-breaking contributions to research on the circulation and climate variability in the oceans, for research on the global heat and salt budgets of the oceans and for his leadership in the creation of the global ocean climate observatory, Argo”). Also in 2018 he was selected for membership in the National Academy of Engineering.

Kathleen Segerson

Kathleen Segerson is a Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor of Economics at the University of Connecticut. She is an environmental economist, with a strong interest in collaborative interdisciplinary work. Her research within economics is primarily applied theory focused on the incentive effects of alternative environmental and conservation policy instruments, with applications to groundwater contamination, hazardous waste management, land use regulation, climate change, nonpoint pollution from agriculture, and protection of marine species. Dr. Segerson is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, a Fellow of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists and of the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association (AAEA), and a fellow at the Beijer Institute of Ecological Economics in Stockholm. She has held numerous editorial positions and has served on a number of advisory boards, including the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Science Advisory Board (SAB) and the Committee on Valuing the Protection of Ecological Systems and Services, the National Academy of Science Advisory Committee for the U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) and Review Panel on the National Climate Assessment, the National Research Council’s Board on Agriculture and Natural Resources (BANR), and the U.S. National Member Organization of the International Institute of Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA). Dr. Segerson holds a PhD from Cornell University and a BA from Dartmouth College.

Patrick J. Sullivan

Patrick J. Sullivan is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Natural Resources and the Environment at Cornell University. Prior to arriving at Cornell, he served for 10 years as a population dynamicist with the International Pacific Halibut Commission. His research interests include developing and applying advanced statistical methods to estimate and analyze the spatial and temporal dynamics of fish in freshwater, estuarine and marine environments, but has worked on marine mammals, birds, bats, insects, invertebrates, forested systems, soils, wetlands, microplastics and aquatic toxins. Dr. Sullivan holds a B.S. in Biology UC Davis, an M.S. in Fisheries Biology and a Ph.D. in Biomathematics and Biostatistics from the University of Washington. He has chaired National Academies’ committees on Improving the Collection, Management and Use of Marine Fisheries Data (2000) and the Review of Recreational Fisheries Survey Methods (2006) and co-chaired the committee on Evaluating the Effectiveness of Stock Rebuilding Plans of the 2006 Fishery Conservation and Management Reauthorization Act (2013). He was a committee member on Science and Its Role in the National Marine Fisheries Service (2002) and is currently a committee member of the Review of the Long-Term Operations of the Central Valley Project and the State Water Project in the Sacramento River and San Joaquin River Delta System in California.

Jyotika Virmani

Jyotika Virmani is the Executive Director of the Schmidt Ocean Institute. Prior to this, she was the Executive Director of Planet & Environment at XPRIZE and oversaw global competitions to spur technology innovation in this domain, including for remote, rapid, and high-resolution seafloor mapping and pH sensors to detect ocean acidification. Before joining XPRIZE, Dr. Virmani was the Associate Director of the Florida Institute of Oceanography and a Senior Scientist at the UK Met Office. Dr. Virmani serves on the Plymouth Marine Laboratory Board of Trustees, Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute Board of Directors, National Geographic’s Committee for Research & Exploration and is co-Chair of the UN Ocean Decade Technology & Innovation Working Group. She is a Fellow of the Royal Meteorological Society and The Explorers Club, and a member of the American Meteorological Society and American Geophysical Union. She has a Ph.D. in Physical Oceanography from the University of South Florida. As a Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholar, she earned a M.S. in Atmospheric Science from SUNY at Stony Brook in the U.S. She also has a B.Sc. in Physics from Imperial College London and is an Associate of the Royal College of Science.

Jeremy D. Wiggert

Jeremy (Jerry) Wiggert is a professor of Marine Science in the School of Ocean Science and Engineering at The University of Southern Mississippi (USM). He served as the Associate Director of USM’s Division of Marine Science (2016-2023), where he led the establishment of the undergraduate Ocean Engineering program at USM that was recently successful in obtaining ABET accreditation. Dr. Wiggert’s recent research centers on the development and utilization of numerical modeling applications to reveal the hydrodynamic and ecological inter-connectivity of the estuarine and shelf regions of the northern Gulf of Mexico, where new insights contribute toward holistic understanding and the refinement of management and restoration strategies in light of water quality impacts that are influenced by changing precipitation patterns and episodic operation of diversion infrastructures (e.g., the Bonnet Carré Spillway). Dr. Wiggert has served on the CLIVAR/IOC-GOOS Indian Ocean Region Panel, was a founding member of the IMBeR / IOGOOS sponsored SIBER program, was the USM representative on the Consortium for Ocean Leadership and is currently serving on the MBRACE Executive Steering Committee. Dr. Wiggert received his B.Sc. in Mechanical Engineering from Case Western Reserve University and later earned Master’s and Engineer’s degrees in Aerospace Engineering at the University of Southern California, where he also earned his Ph.D. in Earth Sciences. Dr. Wiggert was an USRA Visiting Fellow at NASA Goddard, a research associate at the University of Maryland’s Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center, and Research Faculty at ODU’s Center for Coastal Physical Oceanography prior to joining the USM faculty.

Paul S. Williams

Paul Williams is the Policy Coordinator for the Natural Resources Department at the Suquamish Tribe. His initial role at the tribe, in the 1990s, involved managing shellfish and supporting tribal treaty shellfish rights litigation in Federal Court. Paul also initiated numerous projects ranging from a tribal seafood enterprise to multi-agency efforts to assess chemical contamination and restore water quality in shellfish growing areas. As threats to marine ecosystems from climate change and human development intensified, Paul shifted focus to climate change adaptation planning, environmental education, and engaging in Puget Sound Partnership forums to help align and fund tribal, state and federal recovery actions. These forums include the Puget Sound Ecosystem Monitoring Program Steering Committee, the Shellfish Implementation Strategy Advisory Team, and the Partnership Tribal Leadership Team. Paul is also working to increase collaboration by making information more accessible. He joined efforts to establish an open information network to share monitoring and research data, and information on which entities are doing what, where, and why. He also serves on the board of an environmental education organization, and is a former Puget Sound Keepers Alliance board member. Paul holds a Master’s degree in Fisheries Science from the University of Washington.

98th Meeting of the Ocean Studies Board

April 26 - 28, 2022

Past

Agenda

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About

The Ocean Studies Board (OSB) will meet to discuss recent report releases and hear updates from partners. The meeting will be held in a hybrid format and will culminate with the 23rd Annual Roger Revelle Commemorative Lecture - Bioinspired Ocean Exploration from 5:30-7:00 pm ET on Thursday, April 28. The public is invited to register to attend virtually and participate in open sessions.

At this meeting, we welcome six new members of the Ocean Studies Board: Rosie 'Anolani Alegado (University of Hawaii, Manoa), Amy Bower (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution), Tim Gallaudet (US Navy (ret); CEO of Ocean STL Consulting), Galen McKinley (Lamont-Doherty, Columbia University), Dean Roemmich (Scripps Institution of Oceanography), and Paul Williams (Natural Resources, Suquamish Tribe, WA). The biographies for all of the OSB members are available at the OSB website: www.nationalacademies.org/osb/

The public is invited to register via the Register button on the right to join virtually.

Contact

Ocean Studies Board

(202) 334-2714
osbfeedback@nas.edu

Location

Keck Center

500 5th St NW

Washington DC 20001, USA

Disclaimer

It is essential to the National Academies mission of providing evidence-based advice that participants in any of our meetings or events avoid political or partisan statements or commentary and maintain a culture of mutual respect. The statements and presentations during our meetings or events are solely those of the individual participants and do not necessarily represent the views of other participants or the National Academy of Sciences, which is a non-partisan, tax exempt organization that includes under its Charter the National Academy of Engineering and National Academy of Medicine, and that operates the National Research Council.

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Ocean Studies Board

News and Updates

Description

Contributors

Committee

Sponsors

Staff

Major units and sub-units

Contact

Contact us

Provide feedback