Projects

Census of Marine Life scientists are exploring the oceans, making new discoveries, generating information critical to improving our understanding of the oceans and making it available to decision-makers so they can manage and conserve living marine resources for future generations. U.S. participants and sponsors of the global CoML initiative collaborate on 13 field projects and 3 research components.

These projects approach marine biodiversity research from three principal perspectives:

What lived in the oceans?
What lives in the oceans?
What will live in the oceans?

The 13 field projects are:

1. Census of Diversity of Abyssal Marine Life (CeDAMar)
2. The Census of Antarctic Marine Life (CAML)
3. Arctic Ocean Diversity (ArcOD)
4. Biogeography of Deep-Water Chemosynthetic Ecosystems (ChEss)
5. Census of Coral Reefs (Creefs)
6. Gulf of Maine Program (GoMA)
7. International Census of Marine Microbes (ICoMM)
8. Mid-Atlantic Ridge Ecosystem Project (MAR-ECO)
9. Tagging of Pacific Pelagics (TOPP)
10. The Pacific Ocean Shelf Tracking (POST)
11. Census of Marine Life on Seamounts (CenSeam)
12. Natural Geography In Shore Areas (NaGISA)
13. The Census of Marine Zooplankton (CMarZ)

The 3 research components are:

1. Future of Marine Animal Populations (FMAP)
2. History of Marine Animal Populations (HMAP)
3. Ocean Biogeographic Information System (OBIS)

Census of Diversity of Abyssal Marine Life (CeDAMar) - A deep-sea project documenting species diversity of abyssal plains to increase understanding of the historical causes and ecological factors regulating biodiversity and global change.

Project Leaders:
• Dr. Pedro Martinez Arbizu, Deutsches Zentrum fur Marine Biodiversitatsforschung, Forschungsinstitut Senckenberg, Germany
• Dr. Craig Smith, Department of Oceanography, University of Hawaii, Honolulu, Hawaii, USA

The Census of Antarctic Marine Life (CAML) - The Census of Antarctic Marine Life (CAML) will survey the cold Southern Ocean surrounding Antarctica in an attempt to understand the biological diversity of this unique and poorly understood environment.

Project Leaders:
• Professor Michael Stoddart, Australian Antarctic Division, Kingston, Tasmania, Australia
• Dr. Colin Summerhayes, Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research, Scott Polar Research Institute, Cambridge, United Kingdom

Arctic Ocean Diversity (ArcOD) – An international collaborative effort to inventory biodiversity in the Arctic sea ice, water column and sea floor from the shallow shelves to the deep basins using a three-step approach: compilation of existing data, taxonomic identification of existing samples, and new collections focusing on taxonomic and regional gaps.

Project Leaders:
• Dr. Rolf Gradinger, Dr. Russ Hopcroft, Dr. Bodil Bluhm, Institute of Marine Science, School of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences, University of Alaska Fairbanks, Alaska, USA

Biogeography of Deep-Water Chemosynthetic Ecosystems (ChEss) - A global study of the biogeography of deep-water chemosynthetic ecosystems and the processes that drive them.

Project Leaders:
• Dr. Paul Tyler, National Oceanography Centre Southampton, Southampton, United Kingdom
• Dr. Chris German, National Oceanography Centre Southampton, Southampton, United Kingdom
• Dr. Eva Ramirez Llodra, Institut de Ciències del Mar, Barcelona, Spain
• Dr. Maria Baker, National Oceanography Centre Southampton, Southampton, United Kingdom

Census of Coral Reefs (Creefs) - An international cooperative effort to increase tropical taxonomic expertise, conduct a taxonomically diversified global census of coral reef ecosystems, and improve access to and unify coral reef ecosystem information scattered throughout the globe.

Project Leaders:
• Nancy Knowlton, Ph.D., Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, California, USA
• Julian Caley, Ph.D., Australian Institute of Marine Science, Townsville MC, Queensland, Australia
• Russell E. Brainard, Ph.D., Coral Reef Ecosystem Division, Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Honolulu, Hawaii, USA

Gulf of Maine Program (GoMA) – A project documenting patterns of biodiversity and related processes in the Gulf of Maine, which will be used to establish ecosystem-based management of the area. The Gulf of Maine Census of Marine Life is one of seven initial field projects of the Census of Marine Life (CoML). The Gulf of Maine was selected as the ecosystem pilot study for CoML. The goal of this program is to gain enough knowledge to enable ecosystem-based management in a large marine environment. The program will advance knowledge of both biodiversity and ecological processes over a range of habitats and food-chain levels, from plankton to whales.

Project Leaders:
• Dr. Sara Ellis, Census of Marine Life – Gulf of Marine, Berwick, Maine, USA
• Dr. Lewis Incze, University of Southern Maine, Bioscience Research Institute, Portland, Maine, USA
• Dr. Peter Lawton, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Centre for Marine Biodiversity , St. Andrews, NB, Canada

International Census of Marine Microbes (ICoMM) - Building a cyberinfrastructure to index and organize what is known about microbes, the world’s smallest organisms, which account for 90 percent of biomass in oceans.

Project Leaders:
• Dr. Mitchell L. Sogin, The Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole, Woods Hole MA, USA
• Dr. Jan W. de Leeuw, The Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, Texel, The Netherlands
• Dr. Linda Amaral Zettler, The Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole, Woods Hole, MA, USA

Mid-Atlantic Ridge Ecosystem Project (MAR-ECO) - An international exploratory study of the macrofauna of the northern mid-Atlantic Ocean including the processes that control their distribution and community structures in the waters around the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.

Project Leaders:
• Dr. Odd Aksel Bergstad, Institute of Marine Research, Flødevigen Marine Research Station, His, Norway

Tagging of Pacific Predators (TOPP) - A program using electronic tagging technologies to study migration patterns of large open-ocean animals and the oceanographic factors controlling these patterns.

Project Leaders:
• Dr. Barbara Block, Prothro Professor of Marine Sciences, Stanford University, Hopkins Marine Station, Department of Biological Sciences, Pacific Grove, California, USA
• Steven Bograd, NOAA Pacific Fisheries Environmental Laboratory, Pacific Grove, CA USA
• Dr. Dan Costa, Center for Ocean Health, University of California, Santa Cruz Santa Cruz, California, USA
• Don Kohrs Hopkins Marine Station, Stanford University, Department of Biological Sciences, Pacific Grove, California, USA

The Pacific Ocean Shelf Tracking (POST) - A program to develop and promote the application of new electronic tagging technology to study usage of marine environments and migration routes of Pacific Salmon.

Project Leaders:
• Jim Bolger, Executive Director, Vancouver Aquarium, Vancouver, British Columbia

Census of Marine Life on Seamounts (CenSeam) - A global study of seamount ecosystems, to determine their role in the biogeography, biodiversity, productivity, and evolution of marine organisms, and to evaluate the effects of human exploitation.

Project Leaders:
• Malcolm Clark, National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA), Wellington, New Zealand
• Mireille Consalvey, National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA), Wellington, New Zealand
• Ashley Rowden, NIWA, Wellington, New Zealand
• Karen Stocks, San Diego Supercomputer Center, University of California at San Diego, La Jolla, CA USA

Natural Geography In Shore Areas (NaGISA) - An international collaborative effort to inventory and monitor biodiversity in the narrow inshore zone of the world’s oceans at depths of less than 20 meters.

Project Leaders:
• Dr. Shirayama Yoshihisa, Seto Marine Biological Laboratory, Kyoto University, Wakayama, Japan
• Dr. Katrin Iken, University of Alaska Fairbanks, Institute of Marine Science, Fairbanks, AK, USA
• Dr. Patricia Miloslavich, Universidad Simón Bolivar, Miranda, Venezuela
• Dr. Lisandro Benedetti-Cecchi, University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy
• Dr. Edward Kimani, Kenya Marine and Fisheries Research Institute, Mombassa, Kenya
• Dr. Juan José Cruz Motta, Universidad Simón Bolívar, Miranda, Venezuela
• Dr. Gerhard Pohle, Huntsman Marine Science Centre, St. Andrews, New Brunswick, Canada
• Dr. Brenda Konar, University of Alaska Fairbanks, Institute of Marine Science, Fairbanks, Alaska, USA

The Census of Marine Zooplankton (CMarZ) – The Census of Marine Zooplankton (CMarZ) is a global, taxonomically comprehensive biodiversity assessment of animal plankton, including ~6,800 described species in fifteen phyla.

Project Leaders:
• Prof. Ann Bucklin , Marine Sciences and Technology Center, University of Connecticut, USA
• Prof. Shuhei Nishida, Ocean Research Institute, University of Tokyo, Japan
• Dr. Sigrid Schiel, Comparative Ecosystem Research, Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research, Bremerhaven, Germany

Future of Marine Animal Populations (FMAP) - A project that attempts to describe and synthesize globally changing patterns of species abundance, distribution, and diversity, and to model the effects of fishing, climate change and other key variables on those patterns. This work is done across ocean realms and with an emphasis on understanding past changes and predicting future scenarios.

Project Leaders:
• Dr. Boris Worm, Dalhousie University, Department of Biology, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
• Dr. Heike K. Lotze, Dalhousie University, Department of Biology, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
• Dr. Ian D. Jonsen, Bedford Institute of Oceanography, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada

History of Marine Animal Populations (HMAP) – An interdisciplinary research program using historical and environmental archives to analyze marine population data before and after human impacts on the ocean became significant.

Project Leaders:
• Dr. Poul Holm, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland
• Dr. Brian MacKenzie, National Institute of Aquatic Resources, Charlottenlund, Denmark
• Anne Husum Marboe, Roskilde University, Roskilde, Denmark
• Dr. Bo Poulsen, Roskilde University, Roskilde, Denmark

Ocean Biogeographic Information System (OBIS) – A web-based provider of global geo-referenced information on marine species, with online tools for visualizing relationships among species and their environment.

Project Leaders:
• Dr. Edward Vanden Berghe, Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey, USA
• Dr. Mark J. Costello, Leigh Marine Laboratory, University of Auckland, Chair and Executive Officer of the Ocean Biogeographic Information System, New Zealand
• Dr. J. Frederick Grassle, Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey, USA