Associate professor nets $4.1 million oceanography grant

Kayla Webley
2004-11-09
The Daily

Virginia Armbrust, associate professor of oceanography, was awarded a $4.1 million grant last week for her marine phytoplankton research.

Armbrust will receive the grant over the next five years from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation of investigators in marine science.

"The additional funding will provide us with an opportunity to try out new directions," said Armbrust. "I will be able to live out some of my dreams about the kinds of research I would like to do."

Armbrust's research focuses on phytoplankton and their connection to photosynthesis on the planet.

"As a group of organisms they are responsible for about 50 percent of the photosynthesis that goes on on our planet. They are very important organisms for the health of our planet," said Armbrust.

Armbrust's said her research is particularly focused on diatoms, a type of phytoplankton, and their relationship to global warming.

"[Diatoms] play a very important role in carbon cycling because they are organisms that are able to turn CO2 (carbon dioxide), a greenhouse gas, ... into food for other organisms. Because of that they help mitigate global warming due to rising CO2 levels," said Armbrust.

Armbrust is currently working to find out how the phytoplankton survive in the environment.

"I've been very interested in using molecular tools to figure out how phytoplankton make a living in the ocean. We recently were involved with sequencing a diatom and have been able to figure out how these organisms cope with life in the ocean," said Armbrust. "My group has been doing work trying to find how this very important group in the ocean ... will respond to changing environmental conditions."

Russell McDuff, director of the school of oceanography, said the grant is very important to the school.

"I think it's wonderful; it will open a lot of opportunities for [Armbrust] to expand her own research activity, and it spins off to her younger colleagues," said McDuff. "[Armbrust] works in an area really important to us."

The grant is Armbrust's second grant this year.

"As I always say, 'it's a great time to be an oceanographer,'" said Armbrust.

Her first grant, earlier this year, was a $6.4 million grant from the National Science Foundation and the National Institute of Environmental Health to fund the new Pacific Northwest Center for Human Health and Ocean Sciences, a national research center based at the UW.

The center was set up to explore environmental conditions that cause toxic algae blooms and how the blooms affect human health if contaminated seafood is consumed.

"That was a large collective grant between scientists ... to understand the toxic algae blooms affect on human health," said Armbrust.

Armbrust hopes the grant will bring more recognition to the field of oceanography.

"I hope that one thing that will come out of this increased funding and increased visibility will be more people that realize what a great field oceanography is," said Armbrust.