[SEMCO] Press Release: SEA Spring Faculty Lecture Series begins Sunday, January 19

[Jennica Deely]

[image: Inline image 1]*FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:*

*2014 Spring Lecture Series*


* For more information, contact: Jennica Deely, Marketing Coordinator, SEA
| **jdeely at sea.edu* <jdeely at sea.edu>

* | 508-540-3954 **SEA faculty lecture series to cover topics from SEA
Voyages on the Global Ocean*

* January 19 - May, 2014 | 1pm*
Sea Education Association

*James L. Madden Center Lecture Hall *171 Woods Hole Road, Falmouth, MA
*508-540-3954*



*Free and open to the public **January 19* | Dr. Kara Lavender Law, *Plastics
in the Ocean*

*February 16* | Dr. Jeff Schell, *Caribbean Sketchbook: a journey through
history, culture and conservation*

*March 16* | Dr. Amy NS Siuda, *The Importance of Sargassum Species
Distribution*

*April 13* | Dr. Chuck Lea, *Deep Sea Fish and Squid & the Open Ocean
Environment*

*May 18* | Captain Elliot Rappaport, *Leadership Training in the Marine
Environment*

*Lecture #1*

* Plastics at SEA:  The science of ocean “garbage patches”*
* Dr. Kara Lavender Law*

*WHEN:*
January 19, 2014 at 1pm

*WHERE:*
Sea Education Association
James L. Madden Center Lecture Hall
171 Woods Hole Road, Falmouth, MA
*508-540-3954*

*Free and open to the public*


*Presentation Summary*

Ocean pollution by plastic and other man-made debris is a pressing
environmental problem that has captured the attention of marine
conservationists, anti-plastic activists, the media and the general
public.  Though first described in the 1970s, scientific attention to the
topic has increased only recently and misconceptions about the problem are
common.  SEA has been at the forefront of plastics research, with data
collection on floating plastic debris beginning in the 1980s.  Since then,
SEA has collected nearly 10,000 measurements of plastic debris in the
Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, and research efforts have expanded to include
dedicated research expeditions to the North Atlantic and North Pacific
"garbage patches", as well as federally-funded research programs to study
the behavior of plastic in the marine environment and its ecological
impacts.  Dr. Law will discuss the state of scientific research on marine
debris in the world's oceans, with an in-depth look at the research carried
out for more than 25 years by undergraduate students and faculty scientists
on sailing oceanographic research vessels at SEA.

*About the lecturer*

Dr. Kara Lavender Law is a research professor at Sea Education Association
with a PhD in physical oceanography from Scripps Institution of
Oceanography, and a BS in mathematics from Duke University.  With more than
12 months of sea time on oceanographic and sailing research vessels, Dr.
Law’s research interests include large-scale and meso-scale ocean
circulation, intermediate and deep water formation in the North Atlantic
and its role in the meridional overturning circulation, and more recently
the distribution and behavior of plastic marine debris.

Formerly on the teaching faculty at SEA, Dr. Law has taught oceanography to
more than 200 students in 10 SEA Semester classes onshore in Woods Hole, MA
and at sea in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, and the Caribbean Sea.  For
the past several years Dr. Law has been researching plastic marine debris
using SEA's 25-year data set consisting of plastic counts from nearly
10,000 plankton net tows that were carried out by more than 7000 SEA
students and scientists. Her interests include understanding how ocean
physics determines the distribution of plastic and other marine debris, and
the degradation and ultimate fate of different plastic materials in the
marine environment.


*For more information on the lecture series and specific
lectures/lecturers, please contact Jennica Deely, Marketing Coordinator
with SEA *jdeely at sea.edu
508-540-3954



#######



*Jennica Deely*
Marketing Coordinator
Sea Education Association
P.O. Box 6 • Woods Hole, MA 02543
*t:* 508.540.3954 x523
*f:* 800.977.8516
www.sea.edu
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