Oregon Sea Grant has committed nearly $2 million to nine research and outreach projects over the next two years, including investigations into hypoxia and ocean acidification, community tsunami preparedness, and the migration and diseases of native salmon. The competitive awards are funded by NOAA dollars awarded to the Oregon program as one of the nation’s 32 National Sea Grant College Programs.

Stephen B. Brandt, director of Oregon Sea Grant said this round of funding focuses on projects that speak to Sea Grant’s key issue areas and national program goals, as well as OSU’s emphasis on promoting healthy ecosystems, economies and people. The nine research teams will receive between $76,000 and $90,000 in each of the two grant years. The federal dollars are expected to leverage more than $500,000 in state and foundation matching funds over the grant cycle.

All Sea Grant-supported research is required to include an outreach/public engagement component. Sea Grant Extension and communications faculty collaborate with researchers on that aspect of their work, whether it’s enlisting fishermen to help gather marine data, developing publications for targeted audiences or working with communities to develop and improve emergency response plans.

Oregon Sea Grant is also collaborating with three other West Coast Sea Grant programs on two major regional projects. One will apply social science measures to evaluate fisherman-to-consumer direct marketing in coastal communities. The other will attempt to develop a system of measuring and predicting the resilience of coastal communities to climate change. Together, the four Sea Grant programs are contributing $700,000 to those projects over two years.

OregonCoastDailyNews.com, 28 February 2012. Web site.