In May, Deirdre Collins was named the recipient of the prestigious Bermuda Rhodes Scholarship award. Collins will use the scholarship in September to pursue a graduate degree in environmental change and management at the University of Oxford, located in England.

This July BIOS will again host the Groundswell Lionfish Tournament, a festival and fishing competition designed to spread awareness about this aquatic nuisance species. Mark your calendar and bring a fork! It’s time to Eat ‘Em to Beat ‘Em.

There’s no denying that a lionfish, beautifully striped yet as pesky as a rat, is intriguing to see up close. For a group of 12- and 13-year old Bermudians, who dissected and even tasted the fish during a Spirit of Bermuda voyage, it was a highlight of their four-day journey.

This spring, BIOS microbial oceanographer Rachel Parsons and Education Director, University Programs, Penny Barnes, received some good news from the National Science Foundation: their Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) proposal, “Fall Semester Student Research in Oceanography and Marine Science at BIOS,” was awarded funding for three more consecutive years.  This enables eight undergraduates to spend twelve weeks at BIOS each year, with mentorship from a BIOS scientist as they conduct an independent research project. Students hoping to come to BIOS this fall for a fully supported research opportunity (including travel, stipend, room and board) must apply by May 31, 2015.

Humans of many cultures have gone down to rivers to harvest eels for centuries, but even as eels were chopped into bait for fishing, or de-slimed, smoked and savored, they held on to a secret that stumps us to this day.

In balmy Bermuda, it is hard to imagine anything other than fresh air and sea breezes entering people’s lungs.  But over the last two decades, scientists working with the Department of Environmental Protection have discovered there are some places in Bermuda where the air people breathe is similar to the polluted air of a big city.

See more pictures in the Ocean Academy Facebook photo album.

Samia Sarkis, a marine biologist who was the principal investigator of the BIOS aquaculture program for seven years until 2003, returned this spring as an adjunct faculty member at the Institute.

Oceanographer Kristen Buck has been spared the gender discrimination faced by her female predecessors, who until the 1960s were often restricted from science labs, kept from leadership positions, or prohibited from sailing on research vessels.

When Bill Charrier’s two daughters were young, he and his wife Anne traveled during their spring vacations to Bermuda, where Charrier tended to corporate business for his East Coast-based shipping companies. One of his stockholders also served on the board at BIOS and introduced Charrier to the marine research and education goals at the institute.