[ Seminar
Series - Schedule | Archive of 2000-2001
Seminars | Archive of 1999-2000
Seminars | Archive of 1998-1999
Seminars
"Climate and Oceans: The Citizen-Scientist Response"
A Teleconference Panel Seminar Session
Led byPaul Epstein, Mike Connor, Peter Frumhoff and Caroly Shumway
Harvard Medical School, New England Aquarium, Union of Concerned Scientists, New England Aquarium Biographical Sketches
[ Abstracts of Presentations ]Dr Paul Epstein – "Oceans on Overload: Marine Ecology and Health"
Dr. Epstein is Associate Director of the Center for Health and Global Environment (CHGE) at the Harvard Medical School. Dr. Epstein is a widely published public health physician and medical educator with expertise in the areas of marine ecosystems, infectious diseases, and global climate change. He is a member of the Harvard Working Group on New and Resurgent Infectious Diseases and an author of both the Health Section of the IPCC 2nd Assessment Report and the WHO/WMO/UNEP report Climate Change and Human Health. He was the recipient of a National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration's Office of Global Programs and NASA grant to study the health, ecological, and economic dimensions of global change in marine environments. Dr. Epstein is a member of the Harvard University Committee on the Environment.
Some of his recent publications include: "Climate and Health," Science, 1999: 285: 347-348; (with others) "Biodiversity and Emerging Infectious Diseases: Integrating Health and Ecosystem Monitoring." in Biodiversity and Human Health. F. Grifo and J. Rosenthal, Eds. (Washington, D.C., Island Press, 1997) and (with Rita Colwell and Tim Ford, "Marine Ecosystems," Lancet, (1993), 342: 1216-1219 as well as the recent article, "Implications of Global Warming for Public Health", in The Climate Report, Vol. 2, No. 1, (Winter, 2001), pp. 14-17.
Mike Connor - "The Role of Aquariums in Promoting Citizen Climate Talks"
Dr. Mike Connor is Vice President of Programs and Exhibits at the New England Aquarium (NEAq) where he oversees Aquarium programs in research, education, regional conservation, exhibit design, visitor services, and animal husbandry. At the NEAq, Dr. Connor has led or been involved in a number of climate change initiatives. Before joining NEAq, Dr. Connor was Director of Environmental Quality at the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA). He led the development of the harbor and bay monitoring program for MWRA to address public regulatory concerns and the translation of those detailed technical studies into policy options for MWRA’s Board of Directors. In the mid-1980’s, Dr. Connor worked on the start-up of the National Estuary Program in New England. Mike completed his post-doctoral work at the Harvard School of Public Health’s Interdisciplinary Programs in Health, his Ph.D. at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution/Massachusetts Institute of Technology Joint Program in Biological Oceanography, and his undergraduate degree at Stanford, University.
Dr. Connor has published numerous peer-reviewed and popular articles in a variety of fields including marine ecology, environmental policy, environmental engineering, monitoring, watershed management, international water management, and aquarium exhibit design. Relevant recent publications include: Connor, M.S. 2001. Urban Watershed Management as Practiced in Japan and the United States: the Effect of Organizational Frameworks. Section 3.05. In: Watershed 2001, Japan Sewage Works Association, Tokyo, Japan.; and Shaw, D.G., Farrington, J.W., Connor, M.S., Tripp, B.W., and J. R. Schubel. 2000. The role of environmental scientists in public policy: A lesson from Georges Bank. Marine Pollution Bulletin 40/9:727-730.
Peter Frumhoff – "Should We Be Sinking Carbon into the Oceans to Slow Climate Change?"
Dr. Peter Frumhoff is Director and Senior Scientist of the Global Environment Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS). He is also an Adjunct Professor at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. At UCS, Peter leads a multidisciplinary effort to bring scientific expertise to bear on policy decisions affecting global environmental change. He also guides the UCS Sound Science Initiative, which helps more than 3000 U.S. scientists raise public and policymaker understanding of the scientific basis for solutions to climate change, invasive species, deforestation, and biodiversity loss. Trained as an evolutionary ecologist and conservation biologist, Dr. Frumhoff has a Ph.D in Ecology and M.A. in Zoology from UCDavis and a B.A. in Psychology from UCSD. Prior to joining UCS, Dr. Frumhoff taught at Harvard University and the University of Maryland, and served as a AAAS Science and Diplomacy Fellow at USAID. Dr. Frumhoff has conducted field work in numerous Latin American and African countries, and led several Costa Rica-based field courses for US policymakers with the Organization for Tropical Studies. Dr. Frumhoff was a lead author of the IPCC's recent Special Report on the role of forests and land-use in mitigating climate change.
Some of his recent publications include: Niesten et al. (2002) Designing a carbon market that protects forests in developing countries In: I. Swingland et al., eds. 2002. Carbon, Biodiversity, Conservation and Income: an Analysis of a Free Market Approach to Land Use Change and Forestry in Developing and Developed Countries, and Hardner, J.J., P.C. Frumhoff and D.C. Goetze. 2000. Prospects for mitigating carbon, conserving biodiversity, and promoting socioeconomic development objectives through the Clean Development Mechanism. Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change 5:61-80.
Caroly Shumway - "Citizen Action"
Dr. Caroly Shumway, Principal Investigator in Aquatic Biodiversity, has a joint appointment in the Departments of Research and Global Marine Programs at the New England Aquarium. She is an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Biology at B.U. Her program includes development of an NSF-funded exhibit on aquatic biodiversity: Living Links: Choices for Survival; Scientists Without Borders, which links young scientists with African communities in need of biodiversity research and management assistance; Changing Hearts and Minds, a values-based approach to environmental stewardship in the South Pacific; and assistance with freshwater biodiversity conservation and management in the Democratic Republic of the Congo on a USAID-funded project. Dr. Shumway has 11 years of experience in international conservation, ranging from governmental policy (USAID, as a AAAS Science and Diplomacy Fellow) to grassroots work and environmental education (The Nature Conservancy and NEAq), primarily in coral reefs, freshwaters, and rainforests of Africa and South Pacific/Asia. She has been a non-governmental representative on the U.S. governmental delegation for the UN’s Small Islands Developing States Conference (1994) and the UN’s Informal Consultation on Oceans and Law of the Sea Treaty (2001). In 1992-93, she was the Environmental and Science Advisor for AID's South Pacific Regional Program in Fiji. A marine biologist and neuroethologist, Dr. Shumway completed post-doctoral work at Caltech and B.U., her Ph.D. in marine biology from Scripps Inst. of Oceanography, and her B.A. with honours in biology from Wellesley College.Relevant recent publications include: Shumway, C.A. (2001). The role of aquariums in aquatic conservation. Marine Technology Society Journal. 35(1): 63-68; and Shumway, C.A. (1999) Forgotten Waters: Freshwater and Marine Ecosystems in Africa. Strategies for Biodiversity Conservation. A Boston University publication, supported by USAID and the Biodiversity Support Program. 178 pp.
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[ Abstracts of Presentations ]