The URI team includes #URIGSO grad students Philip Yang and Celeste Weidemann, and URI CELS x #URIGSO Professor Andy Davies. Sophia Melville of GSO's Inner Space Center is on board to document the expedition and run live ship-to-shore streams.
Dozens of state leaders and hundreds of URI students, faculty, and staff celebrated the University’s success and impact during URI Day at the State House. Representing #URIGSO, J.P. Walsh’s COAST Lab shared locally relevant research on microplastics & long-term shoreline change.
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🌊 🤝 For #URIGSO student Jacque Rosa, collaboration is at the heart of ocean conservation, from partnering with oyster farmers to shape research questions that are most impactful to their work to engaging vulnerable coastal communities whose first-person perspectives can drive real solutions.
Aerial view of Block Island. Credit: Mackensie duPont Crowley
View from Newport's Cliff Walk. Credit: Mackensie duPont Crowley
View of Block Island's bluffs and the Northeast Light. Credit: Mackensie duPont Crowley
View of Newport's Cliff Walk from First Beach. Credit: Mackensie duPont Crowley
🌊 Rhode Island Sea Grant, based at #URIGSO, will lead a new Island Resilience Cohort that brings together municipal leaders, planners, & community orgs from Aquidneck Island, Conanicut Island, Block Island, Prudence Island, & Hog Island.
➡️ Supporting RI's island communities: buff.ly/tMfNyUO
🚤 At #URIGSO, scientists rely on a fleet of small boats to support hands-on research and education on the water. They're used for sampling, instrument maintenance, and diving operations in Narragansett Bay. They also support classes, labs, and research for students.
Meet the fleet: buff.ly/60ws61S
Marine superintendent at GSO, and Joost van der Zwaag, marine superintendent at Scripps.
Marine superintendent at GSO, Joost van der Zwaag, marine superintendent at Scripps, and Doug Russell, executive secretary, University-National Oceanographic Laboratory System
Rose Dufour, program director, National Science Foundation, gave remarks.
Handing over the watch ⚓
On March 6, #URIGSO hosted a ceremony marking the transfer of the Order of the Ancient Albatross, an honor held by the oldest operating ship in the UNOLS fleet, from the R/V Endeavor to the R/V Robert Gordon Sproul of Scripps Institution of Oceanography. 🚢 🌊
#URIGSO recently hosted an Ocean Workforce Career Fair with URI Ocean Engineering, bringing 21 employers to the Bay Campus. Students from GSO, Ocean Engineering, & Marine Affairs connected directly with orgs across ocean science, engineering, & the blue economy to explore internships & careers!
🚢 Congratulations to #URIGSO alum & Professor Emeritus Robert Ballard, Ph.D. ’74, on the christening of the USNS Robert Ballard (T-AGS 67) over the weekend at Bollinger Shipyards in Pascagoula, Mississippi. The ship will support the U.S. Navy’s oceanographic survey mission for years to come. 🌊 🚢
Research led by #URIGSO's Rainer Lohmann has documented alarming levels of PFAS in Arctic wildlife. Another study, co-led by #URIGSO alum Anna Robuck, has detected PFAS in the baleen of six whale species.
PFAS travel long distances by air and sea, accumulating over time in animals and people. 🦑 🌊
🌊 #URIGSO is excited to welcome Jainey Bavishi, an expert on climate adaptation and resilience, as the guest speaker for the Charles and Marie Fish Lecture on Tuesday, March 10, at 6 p.m.
➡️ Learn more: buff.ly/ZsDENAZ
📍 URI Narragansett Bay Campus, Corless Auditorium, at 215 South Ferry Road
🏄♀️ New #URIGSO research has implications for oceanographers, meteorologists.....and surf forecasters. The study shows that ocean currents can significantly reduce hurricane swells, helping explain why wave forecasts around big storms sometimes look larger than what actually reaches the coast. 🌊 🧪
The #URIGSO community will present its research at the 2026 Ocean Sciences Meeting (OSM) in Glasgow, Scotland, during the week of February 22-27, 2026. #OSM26
🌊 🏴 We’ve gathered a listing of where and when you can find their presentations:
🦪 🌊 On Cape Cod, #URIGSO students and STEEP trainees Justin Sankey and Paola N. Román Morales are working alongside the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe Natural Resource Department and the Town of Yarmouth Division of Natural Resources to collect samples of surface water, fish, and shellfish. 🦑
Anna earned her Ph.D. in oceanography from #URIGSO & now serves as chief of the Cooperative Research Branch & director of the Narragansett Laboratory at NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center. Her career has focused on expanding fishermen’s involvement in scientific data collection & application.
🎉 Congratulations to #URIGSO alum Anna Mercer, Ph.D. ’15 on being named the 2026 #URIGSO recipient of URI’s Ten Under Ten Award! Recognized for outstanding professional achievement & dedication to the URI community, the awards celebrate young leaders who embody the University’s core values.
🌊🧑🔬 On #InternationalDayofWomenandGirlsinScience, we’re celebrating the women shaping the future of ocean science. At #URIGSO, our women faculty, students, and staff drive discovery every day — and through our outreach, we’re inspiring the next generation of girls to be ocean leaders. 🧪
💨 🌊 Strong currents can shrink hurricane waves
#URIGSO researchers used advanced computer simulations to reveal how hurricane-driven ocean currents reduce both the height and dominant period of hurricane surface waves.
🔬 Read more: buff.ly/oADq5mN
Moonrise on 2/2/2026 over Newport with the bow of #RVEndeavor and small ice floes in Narragansett Bay, off the #URIGSO pier. Photo by Veronica Berounsky
🧊 Another cold weekend ahead... stay warm, Rams!
❄️ Watch the snow roll in on our pier webcam: buff.ly/jz3QxkN
📸 : Moonrise on 2/2/2026 over Newport with the bow of #RVEndeavor and small ice floes in Narragansett Bay, off the #URIGSO pier. Photo by Veronica Berounsky
#URIGSO Professor Isaac Ginis and his colleagues in URI Marine Affairs are helping advance how emergency managers prepare for major coastal storms, using advanced forecasting tools and Department of Homeland Security–standard emergency management exercises.
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🛥️📊 These first-year undergrads spent the fall on Narragansett Bay learning boat handling, knot tying, sensor deployment, & real-time data analysis. #URIGSO students supported fieldwork, dove to retrieve instruments, and guided students through MATLAB & data interpretation for their final projects.
🌊🚨 New research on #microplastics in Narragansett Bay
#URIGSO researcher Victoria Fulfer, Ph.D. ’24, and Professor J.P. Walsh have published a new study documenting exponential growth in microplastic pollution in Narragansett Bay since the 1940s.
➡️ buff.ly/oZp0aTc
🌊 PFAS in the Pawcatuck River: A new study led by #URIGSO alum Jarod Snook, & co-authored by members of the Lohmann Lab, has identified long-term sources of PFAS (“forever chemicals”) entering the Pawcatuck River from two historically contaminated textile mill waste ponds in Bradford & Westerly, RI.
12 Rhode Island educators stepped into the role of shipboard scientists aboard #RVEndeavor for a three-day research cruise, steaming 100 miles out to the shelf break and back. They worked with #URIGSO scientists, crew, & marine techs to conduct CTD profiles! #CTDAppreciationDay 🌊 🚢
Credit: #URIGSO marine research associate, Heather Stoffel
Members of the MERL lab at #URIGSO documenting the spatial extent of hypoxia in Narragansett Bay near Quonset Point.
#CTDAppreciationDay 🌊 🚢
📸 #URIGSO student Alyssa Tsukada collecting weekly data for the Narragansett Bay Long-Term Plankton Monitoring program on the Cap’n Bert. ❄️
🌊 🚢 Happy #CTDAppreciationDay! The #CTD measures conductivity, temperature, and depth, and supports countless #URIGSO research efforts! ⬇️ ⬇️ ⬇️
📸 #URIGSO student Alyssa Tsukada collecting weekly data for the Narragansett Bay Long-Term Plankton Monitoring program on the Cap’n Bert, in the snow!
🦪 What does it take to understand oyster health in Narragansett Bay?
For 18 months, #URIGSO student Jacqueline Rosa tracked how water quality and farming methods affect oysters in Narragansett Bay. 🌊 🦑
🔗 Read the story: buff.ly/KKx9XSW
❄️ The latest issue of #AboardGSO is landing in mailboxes now!
🚢 Inside: the retirement of #RVEndeavor, the many ways #URIGSO researchers study phytoplankton, and how our Small Boats Program supports both science and student learning at GSO.
🦪 #URIGSO M.S. student Jacque Rosa is exploring how water quality, particularly carbonate chemistry, & aquaculture gear influence oyster health, growth, and productivity in Narragansett Bay. Over 18 months, her fieldwork with two local oyster farms included 127 water samples & nearly 3,000 oysters.
📸 (left to right) Interim Dean Steve D’Hondt, Kathrine E. Thompson, M.S .’25, Anna Schrecengost, Ph.D. ’25, Rachel C. Marshall, Ph.D. ’25, Professor Roxanne A. Beinart and Associate Dean of Academic and Student Affairs Rob Pockalny, Ph.D. ’91.
🎓 🎉 Congratulations to our recent cohort of #URIGSO graduates!
Five #URIGSO students finished degree requirements in August (two M.S. and three Ph.D.), and five more doctoral candidates finished by December. They join a community of 1,102 #URIGSO alums!
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