Dr. Marie Auger-Méthé receives UBC’s Charles A. McDowell Award for Excellence in Research
This award recognizes demonstrated excellence in pure or applied scientific research by a young faculty member.
Shark-bitten orcas in the Northeastern Pacific could be a new population of killer whale
UBC researchers believe a group of killer whales observed hunting marine mammals including sperm whales, as well as a sea turtle, in the open ocean off California and Oregon could be a new population.
Unilateral efforts to combat illegal fishing may spur piracy in certain regions
Certain policies and policing measures taken by countries to combat illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing drive local actors to engage in piracy, new Sea Around Us research has found.
Microplastics may be accumulating at a high rate in endangered Galápagos penguins’ food web
The model predictions showed a rapid increase in microplastic accumulation and contamination across the penguins’ prey organisms resulting in Galápagos penguin displaying the highest level of microplastics per biomass, followed by barracuda, anchovy, sardine, herring, and salema and predatory zooplankton.
Belizean fishers want changes in policy and practice to revert declining catch trends
During a series of workshops and meetings held in June and December 2023, Belizean fishers endorsed the findings of the stock assessments carried out by the Sea Around Us, which show that commercially important species such as conch and lobster are overfished
How to conduct scientific research with Indigenous Peoples and Lands in a good way
In a comment published in Nature Ecology & Evolution, authors outline four essential elements for conducting ecological research with and for Indigenous Peoples and Lands in a good way. In this Q&A, they discuss these elements and their importance for all scientific research.
Toxic chemicals found in oil spills and wildfire smoke detected in killer whales
Toxic chemicals produced from oil emissions and wildfire smoke have been found in muscle and liver samples from Southern Resident killer whales and Bigg’s killer whales.
Your local sea snail might not make it in warmer oceans – but oysters will
The frilled dog winkle may sound like a complex knot for a tie, but this local sea snail holds clues to our warmer future, including a dire outlook for species that can’t move, adapt, or acclimate as fast as their environment heats up.
AI-powered data-limited stock assessment method more accurate than ‘gold standard’ in predicting sustainable fisheries catches
A recent update introduced to the CMSY methodology used to assess the status of fish stocks has proven to more accurately predict the catch that a population can support than highly-valued data-intensive models.
Low-income countries could lose 30% of nutrients like protein and omega-3 from seafood due to climate change
This could be reduced to a roughly 10% decline if the world were to meet the Paris Agreement targets of limiting global warming to 1.5 to 2 degrees Celsius – which recent reports have shown we’re not on track to achieve.