Join New York Sea Grant and the AQUARIUM of Niagara on their fourteenth annual expedition to the Caribbean. Study the biodiversity of a coral reef ecosystem and the related habitats that support its complex structure. Observe the dynamics of age old survival relationships of unique animals on the reef and the pressures of an emerging industrial island nation on these delicate relationships. Swim and interact with dolphins at the newest dolphin encounter in the Caribbean. Comfortable boats will deliver us to the calm, sheltered coral reef lying just offshore, where you will be snorkeling among the reef fishes in warm water almost as clear as air. This course is a must for nature lovers and science teachers at all levels. Transform life science and social studies lessons with materials and experiences that will allow students to construct their own models of these complex but crucial ecosystems.

DATES: August 5-14, 2003 (10 days). Travel arrangements from Buffalo Airport.

ACCOMMODATIONS: Curacao Sea Aquarium http://www.curacao-sea-aquarium.com & SeaAquarium Villas http://www.royalresorts.com/seavillas.stm, Curacao, Netherlands Antilles; oceanfront facility, double occupancy rooms with private bath, air conditioning, classroom, dolphin encounter, aquarium, and dive shop.

COSTS: $1978.00 includes airfare from Buffalo, room and board, laboratory fee, bus and boat fees, transfers, underwater camera equipment, admissions, hotel and departure taxes, optional PADI Discover SCUBA course, and all tips and gratuities. Tuition extra. School districts may financially support their teachers. This is a Professional Development activity and may qualify for both local district funding and inservice course credit as required by the NYS Commissioner of Education. Significant others welcome at the same cost.

GRADUATE CREDIT: OPTIONAL: Three hours of graduate credit are available from the University at Buffalo. Tuition costs are extra and must be paid directly to the University. Teachers will select a reef organism for study and compile information sheets and level appropriate activities for their classrooms.

EQUIPMENT: You will need snorkeling gear: mask, snorkel and fins. If you need to purchase equipment we will make recommendations and provide any necessary training before the trip. SCUBA gear is provided at no cost.

ADDITIONAL INFO: Contact Helen Domske, New York Sea Grant, 716-645-3610. An informational meeting will be presented Monday, April 28, 2003 at the BOCES Center in Fredonia NY at 7:00 pm.

Great Lakes Research Consortium Student/Faculty Conference
March 14-15, 2003
SUNY College of Environmental
Science and Forestry, Syracuse, NY

THE CONFERENCE
The Great Lakes Research Consortium's annual conference emphasizes student research while providing opportunities for students, faculty and others to meet and share insights and information about Great Lakes-related research, academic programs, science and policy, and the Consortium's many programs. The Conference includes student symposia, research planning meetings, a faculty panel on new and emerging issues, a luncheon with awards for best student papers, and a banquet.

KEYNOTE ADDRESS
The conference will open with a keynote address by Dr. Stephen B. Brandt, Director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory (GLERL) in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

STUDENT SESSIONS
(Undergraduate and Graduate)
Most of the conference is devoted to student presentations and posters of scientific and/or public policy research with a Great Lakes focus or application. Poster presentations are given in a session prior to the banquet. Oral presentations are grouped into various sessions held throughout the conference including: public policy analysis, limnology and ecology, environmental chemistry and toxicology, environmental engineering and modeling, and others. A committee of students will determine final session categories based on the abstracts received.

PANEL DISCUSSION: EMERGING ISSUES IN THE LOWER GREAT LAKES AND ST. LAWRENCE RIVER
The panel will discuss current trends in Lakes Erie, Ontario, the St. Lawrence River and describe new and emerging research issues that need the attention of Great Lakes faculty and their students.

EVERYONE IS WELCOME
Although the Conference is organized for the benefit of the Consortium's member and affiliated institutions, anyone interested in Great Lakes science and policy is welcome to attend and participate.

CONTACT
For more information and copies of the program, visit the GL Research Consortium's homepage at www.esf.edu/glrc. Click "Annual Conference."

The Cutting Edge

Beginning March 1st, University at Buffalo's College of Arts and Sciences is introducing The Cutting Edge lecture series. Developed by CAS dean Uday Sukhatme, The Cutting Edge invites high school students and their families to attend a series of five Saturday morning seminars in the UB Center For The Arts. Noted CAS scholars will offer presentations, affording the opportunity for those attending to find out about recent advancements in a variety of disciplines. High school students who attend at least three of the five lectures will receive souvenir gifts and a certificate designating them as an "Honorary CAS Scholar." Lectures are free and are also open to the general public. For more information, visit http://cas.buffalo.edu/cutting-edge/index.html or call Michele Bewley at 716-645-2711.

Science.gov is Officially Launched

Several years ago, the federal government launched FirstGov.gov to provide a web-based centralized place to find U.S. government information. Most of the information has been on the Internet for a long time but was scattered and difficult to locate. FirstGov.gov aims to bring order to chaos enabling the global community to easily and rapidly find U.S. government information.

As part of this project, FirstGov has just recently launched Science.gov (http://www.science.gov) to provide a gateway to the science and technology information resources of the U.S. government. An interagency working group of 14 scientific and technical information organizations from 10 major agencies developed Science.gov.

The site's search engine allows you to search across web sites and up to ten databases simultaneously. Results from using search terms may include full-text, bibliographic citations, and other types of material. A topic search takes you to specialized sites that can then be explored.

The Nature Yearbook

Palgrave Macmillan is pleased to offer you, at an extremely special price, THE NATURE YEARBOOK OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY 2002 for only $50 (a $225 value). NEWSDAY has hailed NATURE YEARBOOK as "A massive text providing information on thousands of research centers as well as a terrific week-by-week chronology of the year's major scientific news."

From ocean drilling to leptons, asteroid showers to Malaria, and genetically modified food to Tyrannosaurus Sue, this is an annual yearbook for science and related communities. Carrying one of the most prestigious brands in science, this book provides a vast range of invaluable information for the serious scientist as well as the general reader. It contains a chronology of the year's major science news broken down by week, articles on science and society, facts and figures on science research, top institutes and scientists, funding, international organizations, annual prizes, and discussions of the commercial exploitation of science and technology. Additionally, there is a country-by-country guide to science infrastructure from international collaborations to museums, an analysis of technology and business, and selections from Nature's famous "Daedalus" column. 2002 / 2000 Pages / ISBN: 0-333-97147-7

TO ORDER:
Go to: http://www.palgrave-usa.com/catalogue/index.asp?isbn=0333971477 and use PromoCode #NYB50OFF when you order.

Gray Matter

Environmental problems are rarely a case of black and white. Most come in shades of gray. Arguments over logging, endangered species or climate change are never straightforward. They're all tangled up in ethical trade-offs, according to Marc Mangel. He's a mathematician at the University of California in Santa Cruz and co-author of a new book, "The Ecological Detective."

Mangel says math and science can help determine what's happening in the environment. But he says what we choose to do about it usually depends on what we believe in. As an example, he points to a debate over whether to allow whale hunting by native people in the north Atlantic.

"It's simply not a scientific question, it's a value question, and it's a wide range of values that can answer that, right? If I believe that there should be no killing of whales, period, then I have one answer to it. If I believe that we should allow indigenous peoples to pursue historical hunting practices, then there's a different answer to it."

There's another factor that complicates our efforts to control nature. We're limited in what we can do. "We often hear people talk about ecosystem management, which I actually think is an oxymoron. It kind of harks back to the days, perhaps, of the space age, in which we thought, you know, we're going to have a bunch of people sitting at controls managing the environment in the same way that Houston was managing the Apollo thrusters. But we actually don't manage the environment. What we manage is human intervention in the environment."

Mangel says that makes it important for scientists and policy makers to understand how economics, history, and religion influence our thinking about that intervention.

Credit: Earthwatch Radio on the web at http://ewradio.org