First Rule of Lionfish Research

Emily Pickering has a rule about swimming with lionfish: don’t get poked! The OSU first-year student is studying these fierce looking fish with OSU coral reef expert Mark Hixon in the Bahamas. Native to the South Pacific, lionfish are raising havoc in the Caribbean and along the Florida coast. Read Emily’s posts from Lee Stocking Island at her blog, A Chronicle of the Invasion.

Epitaph for a Coral Reef

For OSU coral reef scientist Mark Hixon, climate change is personal. He studied a tropical reef for a decade, and the results of his work stunned and inspired him. In a new book, Thoreau’s Legacy, published by the Union of Concerned Scientists and Penguin Books, Hixon describes the calamity that struck in 1998. His is one of 67 personal stories and reflections on global warming at www.ucsusa.org/americanstories/. A story about Hixon’s research appeared in the spring 2008 issue of Terra magazine.

In waters off the Bahama in 2006, Mark Hixon collected juvenile coral-reef fish for tagging. (Photo courtesy of Mark Hixon)

Results of the Beijing Air Testing

Last July and August, we wrote about Staci Simonich’s research trip to Beijing during the 2008 Olympics collecting air samples in order to study the pollution found there.

Now, the results of this study have been published in the Environmental Science & Technology journal. The Los Angeles Times reported:

The researchers (from Oregon State University and Peking University) discovered that 81% of the time, levels of coarse particulate matter exceeded safe levels as determined by the World Health Organization. And a whopping 100% of the time they reached unacceptable levels for smaller particulate matter, considered more dangerous because it can be inhaled more easily into the lungs.

…

Levels exceeded an average day in Los Angeles by two to four times, and were also higher than pollution levels during previous Olympics in Athens; Atlanta; and Sydney, Australia.

Read the  full results of the study: Atmospheric Particulate Matter Pollution during the 2008 Beijing Olympics

Birds not likely descended from dinosaurs

From Science Daily:

Warm-blooded birds need about 20 times more oxygen than cold-blooded reptiles, and have evolved a unique lung structure that allows for a high rate of gas exchange and high activity level. Their unusual thigh complex is what helps support the lung and prevent its collapse.

“This is fundamental to bird physiology,” said Devon Quick, an OSU instructor of zoology who completed this work as part of her doctoral studies. “It’s really strange that no one realized this before. The position of the thigh bone and muscles in birds is critical to their lung function, which in turn is what gives them enough lung capacity for flight.”

Off to Kenya

Finals this week! And after that, where else to go but Kenya? That’s where Shalynn Pack, a junior in zoology from Marcola, Oregon, will work this summer in pursuit of a career in tropical forest conservation and ecotourism. Check out her lab: Lake Nakuru National Park at www.kws.org/nakuru.html.

Welcome!

Welcome to the Breakthroughs in Science blog!

We’re happy to see you here. A quick orientation: on the left-hand side of the page you’ll find categories that may help you zero in on the topics you’re most interested in. We post frequently with the news of the day, so do bookmark and visit often! We’d like to hear your thoughts and feedback so we can develop the blog to help our alumni, friends, and donors connect with the College of Science.

Please be in touch: anne.ruggiero@oregonstate.edu. Again, welcome. See you again soon!

Dean Sherman Bloomer on a research trip in Japan

FrogWatch USA

Andrew Blaustein, Zoology Professor and Director of the Environmental Sciences Graduate Program at OSU, says amphibians are experiencing mass extinctions:

Oregon State University zoologist Andrew Blaustein says monitoring amphibians is important because they are especially sensitive to environmental changes. They have no hair or feathers and their eggs have no shells, and they also have to survive both on land and in water— what Blaustein calls, “a double-whammy.”

To read more about Andrew and check out some fun pictures from the Blaustein Lab, click here!

Oldest example of mutualism found

OSU’s George Poinar — a researcher and international expert on life forms found in amber — has discovered the oldest example of mutualism ever found.  (Mutualism is a type of symbiotic relationship in which two species help each other… in this case, termites and protozoa.)

From Science Daily:

The analysis of a termite entombed for 100 million years in an ancient piece of amber has revealed the oldest example of “mutualism” ever discovered between an animal and microorganism, and also shows the unusual biology that helped make this one of the most successful, although frequently despised insect groups in the world.

Click here to read the entire article.

Micro-hydro research honors the memory of Edward Rada

Edward as a recent graduate of Oregon State College (as it was then), in Agricultural Economics (Class of ’37, MS in Ag Econ in ’41)

Edward and his wife, Esther M. Rada (class of ’42, Home Economics)

Edward L. Rada was born in Mill City, Oregon in 1916, to Czech immigrant parents.  He left Oregon to serve as a Naval officer in WWII.  He eventually settled in Pasadena, CA, where he earned his doctorate in Economics at University of Southern California.  Edward then joined the faculty at UCLA, retiring in 1986 as Professor Emeritus of Health Economics.  He died in 2005 and is buried near Mill City.

Every summer Edward would return to Mill City for several weeks to walk his boyhood farm and the 25 acres of timberland that he would eventually inherit from his parents. Edward considered the timberland his private “National Forest,” and kept it in near pristine state.

Across the timberland run several creeks, all fed from five different springs.  Edward’s father, Frank, had filed a water rights claim with the state of Oregon in 1948 to use these springs for domestic consumption.  The springs were always considered the most valuable asset of the property and Edward worked hard to preserve their flow and maintain the storage tanks and plumbing that had been built to deliver the water to his parent’s home.  He also strongly believed, long before others, that water would one day be an extremely valuable resource, even in water-rich Western Oregon, and that his springs might eventually be used for power generation.

In that spirit, the Rada family invited Todd Jarvis of OSU’s Water Institute to study the feasibility of operating a spring-fed, hydroelectric micro-turbine on their property.  Jennifer Holderman, an MS student at the Institute, has undertaken this task as her thesis.  Jennifer’s effort is being funded by a gift from Mrs. Esther M. Rada in loving memory of her husband, Edward.

Where, oh Where?

Today’s article on the Cyber Diver News Nework asks the question:

Where have all the big fish gone?

And gives us the answer (spoiler, sorry!):  In our stomachs.

“We have already eaten most of the big fish in the Caribbean according to a new study [by OSU alumnus Dr. Chris Stallings] that links the decline of sharks, groupers and other big fish to a rise in human population.”

Mark Hixon was Chris’ doctoral advisor here at OSU, and was quoted in the article regarding the Lionfish population:

“Lionfish are minor players on their native Pacific reefs, yet they are undergoing a population explosion and overeating small fishes in the greater Caribbean region. Preliminary evidence suggests that lionfish are less invasive where large predatory native fishes are abundant, such as in marine reserves.”

We write about Mark and his work on Breakthroughs because A) he’s a world renowned expert in coral reef ecology, B) his work is vital to OSU’s strategic plan, and C) he’s a great teacher and mentor — and a nice guy to boot.