ABSTRACT

The University of North Carolina at Wilmington (UNCW) will host a Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) Site for three summers. Over the three-year period, the program will engage a total of thirty first-year undergraduates in marine science research experiences during a ten week internship. Research mentors for this program will be drawn from UNCW?s Department of Biology and Marine Biology, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Department of Earth and Ocean Sciences, Department of Environmental Sciences and Department of Physics and Physical Oceanography. Professional development will be offered by the Center for the Support of Undergraduate Research and Fellowships (CSURF), the Watson College of Education and a partnership with the DC Virgo K-8 Lab School, and Experiencing Transformative Education through Applied Learning (ETEAL). Student recruitment will engage students who intend to major in biochemistry, biology, chemistry, environmental science, geology, marine biology, oceanography, physics or closely related fields, including students who are veterans and who are from community colleges and minority-serving colleges and universities.

Initial research focus areas for the REU will center around two interrelated areas of marine science: 1) Mariculture and 2) Water Quality and Contaminants in the Cape Fear River estuary. These topic areas are related to a number of faculty research programs and will allow encouragement of students to develop projects that cross at least two disciplines. Within the Mariculture research focus, student projects can integrate with a wide variety of ongoing studies, such as breeding of shellfish; nutritive assessment of potential new food sources; water quality analyses and mitigation; economics of alternative practices; physical conditions (flow, salinity; other) that may constrain or enhance certain varieties under field conditions; ecosystem impacts of mariculture practices; biology of species used in mariculture, and spatial analysis of farm design. As part of the focus on Water Quality and Contaminants in the Cape Fear River, students will have the opportunity to participate in ongoing faculty research related to the use, management and ecological stability of a large estuary, including projects related to chemistry, biology, earth sciences, environmental sciences, economics, and policy. Projects will be clustered among four areas: dynamics of contaminants and relevant estuarine processes; impacts on fisheries, mariculture, habitats; interface with management / policy and potential influence of climate change; and marine biotechnology as it may relate to these questions.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

Please report errors in award information by writing to: awardsearch@nsf.gov.