Andrew Thaler

#SciFund Returns: Coping with stress: Coral reefs in Kiribati

May 4, 2012May 3, 2012 Andrew Thaler

Science

#SciFund, a month long initiative to raise funds for a variety of scientific research projects, is once again upon us. Project leaders post a project description and an appeal for funds, and members of the public are invited to make small donations to projects that they deem worthy. Donations come with rewards such as access to … Read More “#SciFund Returns: Coping with stress: Coral reefs in Kiribati” »

Recollections from a future ocean – a short story for eno magazine

May 3, 2012May 3, 2012 Andrew Thaler

Science

eno. is the new literary magazine for the Nicholas School of the Environment at Duke University. Its mission is “to inspire a respect for our environment by engaging in thoughtful expression through the use of artistic, reflective, and creative forms.” This year, I have two poems and one short story featured. Both poems can be found … Read More “Recollections from a future ocean – a short story for eno magazine” »

#SciFund Returns – Muddy waters: coral health after storm events

May 3, 2012May 3, 2012 Andrew Thaler

Science

#SciFund, a month long initiative to raise funds for a variety of scientific research projects, is once again upon us. Project leaders post a project description and an appeal for funds, and members of the public are invited to make small donations to projects that they deem worthy. Donations come with rewards such as access to … Read More “#SciFund Returns – Muddy waters: coral health after storm events” »

#SciFund Returns: Seahorse Adventures

May 2, 2012 Andrew Thaler

Science

Towards a personal stewardship ethic – monthly sustainability challenge

May 1, 2012 Andrew Thaler 4 Comments

Uncategorized

We tend towards waste. As a nation, as a community, and in our personal lives, waste is ubiquitous and often imperceptible. That we can afford to discard is an unfortunate side effect of having a high quality of life. Waste is not always a bad thing, either. We’re comforted by the fact that our doctors use disposable needles, that food can be packaged and preserved, that soiled diapers can be discarded. Disposability is freedom from the tedious chores of our grandparents and great-grandparents. It is access to time that can be spent with our loved ones or engaged in more fruitful pursuits. But there is still plenty of unnecessary waste that exists purely for convenience.

Those of us who consider ourselves environmentalist, good stewards of the earth, are often just as guilty of waste, myself included. Over the next several months, I will be exploring ways to reduce my own waste production. Each month I will identify some aspect of my personal life that generates unnecessary waste and explore solutions. Plastic is my major target, but I will also be looking for other resources drains that could be made more efficient (or, if possible, eliminated).

#TaxonomyFail: Salps, Jellyfish, and the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant

May 1, 2012November 4, 2013 Andrew Thaler 26 Comments

Science

I’m a bit late to the party, but last week, several news outlets reported that the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant was taken offline by “jellyfish-like creatures” that clogged several cooling intakes. While most sources were careful to point out that these were “jellyfish-like” organisms, some secondary sources truncated the description and announced that “Nuclear Power Plant Knocked Offline By Tiny Jellyfish, The Invasion Has Begun”. Unfortunately, these organisms are salps, not jellyfish, and you’d be more correct to describe them as human-like rather than jellyfish-like.

Salps are free-swimming pelagic tunicates, one of the most basal members of the chordate phylum. While they superficially resemble jellies to the untrained eye, they are far more derived, possessing three tissue layers (compared to the jelly’s two), a primitive, larval notochord, a perforated pharynx, and the rudimentary beginnings of a centralized nervous system. They form large, clonal colonies that are able to take advantage of plankton blooms by rapidly producing more clones to capitalize on an unpredicatable food source. Although I don’t have first hand reports, this is likely what happened in Diablo Canyon, as warm water discharges from nuclear power plants can trigger massive plankton blooms. Far from a “jellyfish invasion”, this was probably the natural response of a predator to increased food availability.

The Ocean Question: What is your favorite marine organism and why?

April 26, 2012April 26, 2012 Andrew Thaler 12 Comments

Science

We caught up with 11 marine scientists (including one honorary marine scientist, paleoblogger Brian Switek) at this year’s Ocean Sciences meeting in Salt Lake City and asked them the following question – What is your favorite marine organism and why? Their responses ranged from the classic (dolphins and sharks) to the bizarre (deep-sea shrimp and snails) to the exceptionally … Read More “The Ocean Question: What is your favorite marine organism and why?” »

Before the Lights Go Out – Alternative Energy and America’s Grid

April 25, 2012April 25, 2012 Andrew Thaler

Science

Fossil fuels, photovoltaics, clean coal, wind turbines, hydroelectic dams, nuclear reactors, hydraulic fracturing. For all the discussions of energy independence, sustainable energy, renewable fuels, one word is often painfully absent: grid. America’s electrical grid has evolved from Edison electric generators and a few, uninsulated, wires in New York and Wisconsin to a massive, and massively inefficient, network of power lines, control stations, and generators that crisscross the country in three power blocks. This mycelial behemoth serves one function–to keep the electrons flowing. In Before the Lights Go Out: Conquering the Energy Crisis Before It Conquers Us, Maggie Koerth-Baker strips the wires of the United State’s electrical grid bare, revealing how it works, how it doesn’t work, and what we can do to make it work better, increasing efficiency, decreasing atmospheric carbon dioxide production, and securing America’s energy infrastructure.

Before the Lights Go Out begins with a bold and inspired move by Koerth-Baker. By choosing to focus on the development of our energy infrastructure and the challenges inherent in the current model, she bypasses the common stumbling block of “energy crisis” arguments in the United States–the unwillingness of some groups to accept the uncontroversial recognition of anthropogenic climate change. Improving the efficiency of the grid, incorporating alternative energy sources into our infrastructure, reducing waste which cost energy producers and consumer real capital, these are not goals that require an a priori understanding of climate change to make sound economic, social, and political sense. Koerth-Baker deftly skirts around the quagmire of one of our most baffling political debates and dives straight into solutions.

VentBase – securing the conservation of deep-sea hydrothermal vent ecosystems

April 16, 2012April 17, 2012 Andrew Thaler 3 Comments

Conservation, Science

As a marine biologists just beginning my deep-sea education, conservation as a priority was an alien concept. The deep sea was the last true wilderness, distant and alien, impossibly difficult to access. We knew that exploitation was coming, companies had been exploring the potential of deep-sea mining for decades, but they always seemed to be generation away. Conservation was a question for my scientific descendants. For my peers and me, we still had a few good decades left in the golden age of exploration that began in the 1970’s with the first discovery of deep-sea hydrothermal vents. That age is about to end.

The reality of deep-sea exploitation is imminent. The first hydrothermal vent mining lease has been issued in the territorial waters of Papua New Guinea. The International Seabed Authority, which regulates seafloor extraction in international waters, has approved the first two mining exploration permits for seafloor massive sulfides in international waters. Manganese nodule extraction, once quashed by a global decline in metal prices, has recently reappeared. Crustal metal deposits are fast becoming a viable resource. The isolation of rare earth elements from the seafloor, a newcomer in deep-sea exploitation, could open up new, massive deposit for critical electronic components. All of these are likely to occur within the next few decades.

I sing the praise of my robot underlings, the workhorses of deep sea exploration

March 28, 2012March 28, 2012 Andrew Thaler 5 Comments

Science

Building the Remote Lee. Photo by Andrew Thaler

James Cameron’s triumphant dive and (equally important) return from the Challenger Deep is a landmark achievement. In 62 years, only 3 people have ever visited the bottom of the Mariana Trench. While budgets for scientific exploration have been cut across the board, Cameron ponied up tens of millions to build only the second human-occupied submersible capable of reaching those depths. But the Deepsea Challenger is not the only visitor to Challenger Deep in the last few decades. In May, 2009 the ROV Nereus plumbed the depths of Challenger Deep. More than a decade before that, Kaikō, a Japanese ROV, became the first unmanned vehicle to reach into the Mariana Trench and return with video, sediment, and biological samples during several return trips.

And, while Alvin is in drydocks and human-occupied submersibles are tragically being mothballed across the country, more remote operated vehicles are exploring the ocean than ever before. They are being built and run by scientific institutions, private firms, public universities, high schools, industrial corporations, and individual citizens. My lab mate and I built one last winter, for fun. And while I agree with Al and Craig at Deep Sea News that ROV’s are not as “sexy” as human occupied submersibles, that is a marketing problem, because, like it or not, ROV’s are the real masters of deep sea exploration. If your goal is to learn as much as possible about the deep ocean, if you want the biggest return on your investment, if you want to involve a huge and diverse exploratory team, the ROV is king.