News

The world’s abalone are threatened, endangered or otherwise vulnerable in nearly every corner of the planet. While captive breeding efforts are underway for some species, these giant sea snails are notoriously difficult to spawn. If only we could wave a magic wand to know when abalone are ready to reproduce, without even touching them. 

About the size of a small school bus, the basking shark is the second largest fish in the ocean and is found in temperate and tropical waters across the globe. In the mid-1900s, basking sharks were observed by the thousands each year off California’s coast. Now they are rarely seen at all in this region, called the California Current Ecosystem, or CCE.

From Jeff's obituary in The Press Democrat:

Jeffery R. Demarest—biologist, naturalist, world traveler, great cook, and bon vivant—passed suddenly and unexpectedly on January 12, 2022, at his home in Healdsburg, CA. Martha Noble, Jeff's wife of 36 years, was beside him. He is dearly missed by his wife, countless friends, and colleagues from across the country and beyond.

The Ecological Society of America (ESA) announced the Katherine S. McCarter Graduate Student Policy Award (GSPA) 2022 cohort, which includes two UC Davis Coastal and Marine Sciences Institute affiliates, Jessica Griffin and Sophie Zhu. This award provides graduate students with the opportunity to participate in a virtual Congressional Visits Day.

Congratulations to CMSI Affiliates Dr. Jay Stachowicz, Professor and Department Chair in the Department of Evolution and Ecology, and Dr. Christine Kreuder Johnson, Professor of Medicine & Epidemiology at the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine for being elected 2021 American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Fellows.

Habitat conservation can help buy time for heat-sensitive species in the face of climate change – but it might also leave them in a trap by preventing them from adapting in time, according to a new study from the UC Davis Bodega Marine Laboratory recently published in the journal Ecology.

Read the article on ucdavis.edu

David Gold, assistant professor in the UC Davis Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, has received a CAREER grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to investigate biomarkers for identifying the oldest animal fossils on Earth.

We are very pleased to welcome Dr. Christina Pasparakis to the Bodega Marine Laboratory and Coastal and Marine Sciences Institute community. She will be joining the Department of Environmental Toxicology as the new Coastal/Marine Toxicologist, and be based at Bodega Marine Laboratory. 

Dr. Rachael Bay, a Coastal and Marine Sciences Institute affiliate and faculty member in the UC Davis Department of Evolution and Ecology, has been named a member of the 2021 Class of Packard Fellows!

“This is actually better than sustainable, because the more you fish it, the better off the kelp forest will be. This is a restorative seafood product.”

-Laura Rogers-Bennett, a research associate at the University of California, Davis and a scientist at the California Department of Fish and Wildlife