New funding for research on Microbially Influenced Corrosion
May 13, 2025. Our collaborative project received funding under the MUST VI program (Office of Naval Research, DoD) ($188k direct).
Best presentation in Departmental Graduate student conference
May 13, 2025. Congrats to Emma for winning the award for the best Master’s presentation in the Annual Biology Conference!
Funding on marine biofilms
Nov 22, 2024. We received a new funding supplement ($55k) to continue our industry-collaborative work on Transparent surface coatings in marine antifouling (Funding primary NAVSEA, ONR).
Stem4Girls
Oct 5, 2024. We ran our “plankton to plastic” workshop at the Stem4Girls event for groups of middle-school aged girls. This was a team effort – thanks Lucy, Emma, Subham for helping design the successful workshop, and preparing, leading, and assisting! Major thanks to the university’s STEM education team for organizing this annual event that brought >400 girls to the UMassD campus.
More new equipment: anaerobic hood
Sep 20, 2024. We now have an anaerobic hood! This new equipment/resource will serve the work in the recent ONR-funded projects.
Blue Economy Funding: Pier Instrumentation
Aug 14, 2024. Our proposal ($335k) for an instrumentation suite on the university pier was funded through the Massachusetts Blue Economy Initiative. The award will support the acquisition and deployment of technology to facilitate continuous water quality measurements on the UMass Dartmouth pier on Clark’s Cove in Buzzards Bay. The aim is to create a data portal displaying current Bay conditions, made available to the public and full access will be available for team members, their students, and collaborators, including industry partners.
Gordon Research Conference: Marine Microbes
Jun 15, 2024. Pia participated in the Gordon Research Conference: Marine Microbes in Les Diablerets, Switzerland, hosting a session on Marine Animal Microbiomes and presenting a poster in the conference.
Thesis proposal defense
May 21, 2024. Congrats to Emma Steedman who completed her research proposal defense for MS in Marine Biology: Spatio-temporal Distributions of Nitrogen-Fixing Microorganisms in Buzzards Bay.
New ONR grant to investigate Microbially Influenced Corrosion
Apr 12, 2024. A collaborative grant ($230,402) was awarded from the Office of Naval Research (MUST program) titled Microbially Influenced Corrosion of Materials in Marine Applications
New funding: SBIR contract to study marine biofilms
Apr 12, 2024. A NAVSEA SBIR contract ($54,926) was awarded, titled Transparent Surface Coatings in Marine Antifouling
Thesis proposal seminar
On Apr 5, 2024. Congrats to Lucinda Manlick who completed her MS research proposal seminar: Metagenomic Analysis of Marine Bacterial Biofilms on Microplastics
Thesis defense!
On Jan 11, 2024. Kenneth Boyle did an excellent job defending his MS in Marine Biology “Marine Biofilm Community Assembly is Driven by Seasonality in the Coastal Northwestern Atlantic Ocean“. Congratulations Kenny for this exciting work!
Pilot study on microplastics funded by MIT SeaGrant
On Jan 11, 2024. We received a small grant for a pilot study from MIT SeaGrant for developing methodology for FTIR-microscopy to characterize microplastics.
New Cohort of STREAM Grant Projects Support Coastal Education and Community Science
Stem4Girls outreach event
On Oct 28, 2023. This was our second year participating in the Stem4Girls event, this time with the workshop “From Plankton to Plastic – Food Webs and Plastic Pollution in the Marine Environment“. Lucy did a great job designing and leading the workshop!
Ph.D. Defense by Abhishek Naik
On Oct 27, 2023. Abhishek Naik did a terrific job defending his dissertation on Marine biofilms on artificial structures as a model for microbial community succession and stability. Congratulations Abhi!
Publication in mSphere
16 October, 2023. Abhi is the first author on this paper in mSphere that was just published with co-authors at NUWC. The paper: Disturbance frequency directs microbial community succession in marine biofilms exposed to shear is a result of a collaborative study conducted in Stillwater Basin in Narragansett Bay. The work tested two antifouling technologies (foul-release paint and contactless underwater shear) representing pulse or press disturbance, respectively, on biofilm succession and stability. The results demonstrate high antifouling effectiveness of a combination of press+low frequency pulse disturbance and unexpected enrichment of shear tolerant taxa under high frequency shear. The results also showed high level of connectedness of certain diatoms and affiliated bacteria in the biofilms through the disturbance continuum, providing understanding of persisting associations and revealing potential targets for future antifouling technology development.
Publication in Environmental Microbiology
23 August, 2023. An article was published in Environmental Microbiology describing Vibrio cyclitrophicus L- and S-strain biofilm formation and association with marine Acartia tonsa copepods. The publication stems from graduate research by the lab alumnus Ryan Nuttall. Work with Green Fluorescent Protein-labelled strains demonstrated that small genetic differences correlate with the initial colonization process of these Vibrio strains on marine copepods and that calcium is a major driver of strain specific differences in their biofilm formation. These intriguing results provide insights into the complexity of Vibrio spp. association with marine copepods and particles.
Publication of New Oceanic Global Database of Nitrogen fixation
15 August, 2023. An article was published in Earth System Science Data: Global oceanic diazotroph database version 2 and elevated estimate of global oceanic N2 fixation. The article is a large effort by Shao et al., and includes over 90 contributors.
Microbially Influenced Corrosion Study 2023 highlighted
July 2023. Our study at the Lloyd Center shoreline was highlighted on the Center’s website:
Study at Lloyd Center – Microbially-Influenced Corrosion in Marine Sediments
Recent Defense
On May 10, 2023 Stephanie Richard successfully defended her M.S. in Marine Biology- Impact of climate change on copepod microbiome. Congratulations Stephanie!
Recent and upcoming conferences
Stephanie Richard presented her work Impacts of climate change on copepod microbiome in the recent Microbiome conference in the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, New York (Nov 2022)
Kenny Boyle presented his research Microbial community assembly of marine biofilms in the coastal Northwestern Atlantic Ocean in the Sigma Xi conference at Dartmouth, MA in April 2023.
Abhishek Naik presented his research poster at the MUST research meeting in March 2023.
Instrumentation news
New FTIR instrumentation (Nicolet iN10 micro+iZ10) has arrived and has been installed in the lab.
We recently acquired an Agilent Novocyte flow cytometer and a new qPCR instrument.
Funding news
May 2023. New collaborative award: UMass Systems’s Office of Technology Commercialization & Ventures Technology Development Research Grant. Long-lasting super-hydrophobic surface for reducing marine biofouling. PI: H Ling (UMD Mechanical Engineering), Co-PI P Moisander.
Spring 2023. PADI foundation awarded us a grant for a pilot study on microplastics
Spring 2023. A new seed funding grant ($22,134) to investigate Microbially Influenced Corrosion in marine sediments. The project is collaborative with Ryan Beemer (Civil and Environmental Engineering).
Fall 2022. Woods Hole Sea Grant awarded us funding for a pilot study on microplastics
2022: Massachusetts Technology Collaborative award is supporting work in parallel with the new Marine and Environmental Biodegradability laboratory at the School of Marine Science
2020-2024 Research continues on Office of Naval Research-funded work on two collaborative projects: Advances in marine technology: New solutions to biofouling and: Antifouling property and lifetime of super-hydrophobic surfaces in marine environment.