When modeling low-oxygen environments, researchers examine chemical signals of biogeochemical cycles, but rarely do they try to model the microbial community underlying those cycles. Sarah Preheim of Johns Hopkins University (JHU) used a lake ecosystem to model how the microbial community responded to anoxic conditions. She hopes to one day apply techniques learned from the lake study [...]
New Developments in Autonomous Underwater Vehicles Written by Paul Stankiewicz & Marin Kobilarov, Johns Hopkins University Figure 1: Map of the test areas used for adaptive sampling. All deployments were conducted with an Iver3 AUV pictured in the bottom left. This past year saw significant progress on developing autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) technology for [...]
As those involved with the Consortium are well aware, nutrient pollution is one of the ‘grand challenges’ of our time. It is a particularly vexing problem given the complex web of ecological, social and economic factors involved. Despite significant attention being paid to addressing nutrient pollution by governments agencies, industry, non-governmental organizations and other stakeholders, important [...]
NOAA Research Consortium Delivers New Reports The Mid-Atlantic Regional Integrated Sciences and Assessments (MARISA) recently published a summary of Chesapeake Bay Climate Impacts for the fall season of 2018. MARISA is a consortium of research organizations, led by the nonprofit RAND Corporation and funded by a 5-year grant from NOAA. As stated on its website, [...]
A Johns Hopkins professor is determined to make sure the same pitfalls of agriculture aren't repeated in aquaculture. Jillian Fry, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Livable Future's Seafood, Public Health, and Food Systems Project, is an expert in all things aquaculture. Image created by Paul Garland for Johns Hopkins Magazine This year, the [...]
Animals and plants can use the pigment melanin to gain heat from their environment, maintaining comfortable body temperatures. This is known as thermal melanism. But melanin also serves other functions in biology. In humans, for example, melanin helps prevent exposure to ultraviolet radiation, so humans who live closer to the equator often have higher levels of [...]
During the water treatment process, toxic compounds are often oxidized into what scientists presumed were less harmful chemicals called "transformation products." But less is known about these transformation products than scientists thought. "Once the chemical is gone, the job - it would seem - is done, but in fact we don't always know what removal of [...]
Harihar Rajaram will join the Dept. of Environmental Health and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University (JHU) as a Professor in September 2018. Rajaram was previously Professor, President’s Teaching Scholar and Clark Faculty Fellow at the University of Colorado, Boulder. Rajaram’s research focuses on mathematical modeling of environmental and earth systems, including computational, analytical and stochastic approaches. [...]
The National Science Foundation (NSF) supports summer research opportunities for undergraduates across the country. Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) are programs with cohorts of 10-15 students designed to give students the opportunity to pursue independent research projects outside of their university. The students work closely with a mentor on a specific research project and are granted [...]
Conowingo Dam CRC Director Bill Ball was recently quoted in a Johns Hopkins Magazine article about the need for increased upstream agricultural BMPs to alleviate the sediment build-up behind Conowingo Dam. The dam has been in place, collecting sediment, for almost a century. The dam was completed in 1928 as a hydroelectric and flood [...]
