Kate Stafford, an oceanographer with UW’s Applied Physics Lab, wanted to find out if any endangered bowhead whales passed through the Fram Strait, an inhospitable, ice-covered stretch of sea between Greenland and the northern islands of Norway. When she listened to the audio picked up by a recording device that spent a year in the icy waters, she was stunned at what she heard: whales singing a remarkable variety of songs nearly constantly for five wintertime months.
Read more »Underwater ‘electrical outlets’ put in place for cabled ocean observatory project - UW Today
The first U.S. cabled ocean observatory reached a milestone on July 14 with the installation of a node 9,500 feet deep off the coast of Oregon. Like a giant electrical outlet on the seafloor that also provides Internet connectivity, the node was spliced into a network of cable segments totalling some 560 miles that were laid in the summer of 2011.
Read more »Check out what UW is doing to address environmental sustainability!
Check out these highlight stories and videos from units such as arts and sciences, College of the Environment, built environments, landscape architecture, continuing education — as well as news outlets like KUOW and Dogster. You can read more about all of what’s happening in the sustainability arena at UW here!
Read more »Would legalizing ivory slow astronomical poaching rates? - Washington Times
More than 24 tons of illegal ivory were seized around the world in 2011 — an annual record. International authorities are weighing a surprising new approach to curbing the trade: making it legal again. UW’s Center for Conservation Biology Director, Samuel Wasser, is quoted. Read more here.
Read more »Washington's forests will lose carbon storage to increased wildfires - Phys.org
A new study co-authored SEFS‘ Crystal Raymond finds that as much as 1/3 of the stored carbon in Washington’s forests will be lost to the atmosphere by 2040, as a result of climate change-induced increases in the area burned by wildfires. Read more here.
Read more »