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BROTMAN COASTAL BIOLOGY LECTURE SERIES
Members of the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at the University
of N. Florida in Jacksonville, have the opportunity to attend the
following set of lectures put on by the UNF Biology Department.
Thursday, September 25, 8pm
Dr. Nancy Rabalais, Executive Director and Professor
at the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium, will lecture on the
Dead Zone in the Gulf of Mexico at at The University Center at UNF.
Humans are having a large negative impact on the Gulf of Mexico
ecosystem. Due to excess run-off humans are unintentionally depositing
high levels of nutrients into the Gulf. These nutrients serve as supplements
to promote the growth of algae. This gives rise to large blooms. Once
the blooms start to decay bacteria will consume the waste material.
The more bloom material that is present, the more bacteria will thrive.
These bacteria are capable of depleting oxygen levels in the Gulf
thus robbing other organisms (fish, crabs, etc) of the oxygen levels
they require to live.
Thursday, October 23, 8pm
Dr. Chuck Amsler, a biology professor at the University
of Alabama at Birmingham, and Maggie Amsler, a research
assistant at the same university, will discuss Antarctic Marine Biology
at The University Center at UNF.
Chuck and Maggie Amsler are a husband and wife research team who
travel with their students to the Antarctica each winter and study
life under the ice. Their personal experience, photographs and movie
clips provide a fantastic perspective of the Antarctic Ocean. Their
many discoveries document a diversity of life and interactions between
ice, algae, and animals of the Antarctic seldom examined in documentaries
about the Antarctic.
Thursday November 20, 8pm
Dr. Ann Pabst, Graduate coordinator and assistant
chair in the Department of Biology and Marine Science at The University
of North Carolina Wilmington, will discuss marine mammals at The University
Center at UNF.
Professor Ann Pabst is a renowned Marine Mammologist who examines
whales and dolphins from a perspective seldom considered by the public.
How can these animals which are descended from land animals swim,
hold their breath so long, and withstand the pressure of diving so
deep? Of course, she also is involved with understanding why these
animals die from interactions with us humans and works with various
groups trying to limit the deaths of these majestic animals.
All lectures are free and open to the public.
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