Coral bleaching is a significant problem for the world’s ocean ecosystems: When coral becomes bleached, it loses the algae that live inside it, turning it white. Corals can survive a bleaching event, but while they are bleached they are at higher risk for disease and death. Now an international consortium of scientists, including Marine Biology instructor Jacqueline Padilla-Gamiño, has created the first-ever common framework for increasing comparability of research findings on coral bleaching.

A new University of Washington and NOAA Fisheries study found that sea lions have the largest negative effect on early-arriving endangered Chinook salmon in the lower Columbia River. The results of this study will publish Oct. 18 in the Journal of Applied Ecology.

The small subpopulation of polar bears in Kane Basin were doing better, on average, in recent years than in the 1990s. The bears are experiencing short-term benefits from thinning and shrinking multiyear sea ice that allows more sunlight to reach the ocean surface, which makes the system more ecologically productive.

The Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center is launching a new citizen science project called OceanEYEs and is seeking volunteers to help find Deep 7 bottomfish in underwater videos.
Hana Ra’s (BS Biology, 2020) interest in citizen science began when SAFS Professor Julia Parrish gave a presentation on the Coastal Observation and Seabird Survey Team (COASST) program in Ra’s marine biology course. 

An international group of scientists has laid out an ambitious global conservation plan for parasites. A related paper led by the University of Washington found that responses of parasites to environmental change are likely to be complex, and that a changing world probably will see both outbreaks of some parasites and a total loss of other parasite species.

In their most recent book, Sarah Converse (unit leader, USGS Washington Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit, and UW associate professor in Aquatic and Fishery Sciences and Environmental and Forest Sciences) and her co-editors explore how managers can use a structured decision making approach to aid in solving natural resource problems.

The UW Center for Latino Health has recognized 32 UW Latinx faculty for scholarly achievements, including Jacqueline Padilla-Gamiño, assistant professor at the UW School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences and instructor for Marine Biology, who has been honored for the second year in a row. This annual event honors the scholarly achievements of Latina and Latino faculty across the three campuses of the University of Washington.

In times of extreme duress, a shining beacon of hope can come from communities working together to support one another. The University of Washington Medical Center, in preparation for an influx of patients in the coming weeks, recently put out a call for medical supplies. Researchers from around the College of the Environment answered that call, realizing that much of what the Medical Center needed were common items found in research labs, and quickly mobilized to collect donations and drop them off at UW Surplus.

The next time you eat sashimi, nigiri or other forms of raw fish, consider doing a quick check for worms. A new study led by the University of Washington finds dramatic increases in the abundance of a worm that can be transmitted to humans who eat raw or undercooked seafood. Its 283-fold increase in abundance since the 1970s could have implications for the health of humans and marine mammals, which both can inadvertently eat the worm.

Any old fish can swim. But what fish can walk, scoot, clamber over rocks, change color or pattern and even fight? That would be the frogfish. The latest book by Ted Pietsch, UW professor emeritus of aquatic and fishery sciences, explores the lives and habits of these unusual marine shorefishes. “Frogfishes: Biodiversity, Zoogeography, and Behavioral Ecology” was published in March by Johns Hopkins University Press.