February 7: Biodiversity in Our Ocean — A Natural History Museum Vision
Dean Pentcheff and Dr. Regina Wetzer, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County

Natural history museums: stuffed animals, dinosaurs, and dust, right? That’s not the whole story (though, truth be told, we’ve got all those, too). Natural history museums are, it turns out, drivers of exciting new developments in biodiversity science. As the world changes and populations increase, we need new ways to see how our presence on the coast affects (and can benefit from) the ocean’s biodiversity. New genetic approaches, using “environmental DNA”, promise to let us inventory our biological surroundings, including our coastal communities, with unprecedented detail and speed...READ MORE





April 3: Marine Heatwaves of the North East Pacific: Will “Blobs” be the new normal?
Dr. Andrew Leising, NOAA Southwest Fisheries

The marine heatwave (MHW) of 2014-2015, aka “The Blob” was an extreme event of high sea surface temperatures across a vast portion of the northeast Pacific (NEP). Areas of anomalously warm water are considered heatwaves when their temperature is greater than 90% of measurements ever taken at that location for more than 5 days in a row. To put the “Blob” and the more recent heatwave of 2019 into perspective, satellite data of sea surface temperature was analyzed from 1982 (the birth of modern sea surface temperature sensors on satellites) to fall 2019...READ MORE










June 5: Just say no to drugs: The spread of antibiotic-resistant bacteria into our coastal wetlands
Dr. David Cummings, Point Loma Nazarene University

Human activities in coastal watersheds can negatively impact nearshore habitats such as beaches and estuaries. Human and animal fecal sources contribute bacteria and viruses to storm water, leading to beach closures due to the unsafe conditions. We have discovered that many of the transient bacteria that are brought to coastal estuaries from urban watersheds are multi-drug-resistant, increasing public health concerns about human contact with these waters...READ MORE









August 7: Bringing Dark Data into the Light, One Shell at a Time
Dr. Nicole Bonuso, CSU Fullerton

The vast majority of fossil data lies tucked away in museum drawers waiting to be rediscovered. Many fossil collections throughout the eastern Pacific region, including those collected in Los Angeles and Orange County, CA decades ago, remain invisible to the majority of researchers. The Eastern Pacific Invertebrate Communities of the Cenozoic (EPICC) - a collaboration of 10 natural history museums and academic institutions - focuses on opening museum cabinet drawers to provide global access to fossil marine invertebrate data that is otherwise only accessible to a limited few...READ MORE









October 2: The Risks of Climate Change on the Most Vulnerable Species and Ecosystems
Dr. Nina Bednarsek, SCCWRP

The negative effects of climate change on the global oceans are rapidly intensifying with respect to ocean acidification, oxygen decline and warming, and are resulting in decline in suitable habitats for the vulnerable species. These effects are taking place from the coasts to the open ocean across the tropics to the poles, with California coast being one of the most susceptible regions for future climate change, which is disconcerting given its richest fisheries and most diverse marine ecosystems. In fact, the effects on marine organisms are already observed in the California waters...READ MORE








December 4: Rocky Intertidal Ecosystems in Urbanized Southern California: Long-term Change, Human impacts, and Management
Dr. Jayson Smith, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona

Rocky intertidal habitats are located at the interface between land and the sea and are incredibly diverse despite being naturally harsh habitats due to stresses associated with, for example, frequent aerial exposure during low tides and high wave disturbance. In heavily urbanized southern California, human impacts, including visitation, exploitation, climate change, pollution, and introduced species, can further add to these stresses, resulting in long-term changes in the abundances and distributions of marine flora and fauna...READ MORE

December 6, 2019: Dr. Brian Livingston, California State University, Long Beach
Sea Star Wasting: Does environmental stress lead to an autoimmune response?
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October 4, 2019: Dr. Chuck Kopczak, California Science Center 
Sex and Kelp and Science Ed – Confessions of a Kelp Addict
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August 2, 2019: Dr. Jason Keller, Chapman University
Exploring "Blue Carbon" in California Salt Marshes
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June 7, 2019: Dr. Barbara Taylor, Southwest Fisheries Science Center
An urgent message from Mexico’s vaquita porpoise: protect me, protect life (yours included)
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 April 5, 2019: Shelly Moore, Southern California Coastal Water Research Project (SCCWRP)
There is a great future in plastics: So what’s the big (and little) deal?
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February 1, 2019: Dr. John Dorsey, Loyola Marymount University
Teaming with Nature in Managing Urban Runoff: More Bang for the Buck!
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December 7, 2018: Dr. Ian Fenty, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Warming oceans, melting ice, and rising seas

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October 5, 2018: Dr. Craig Stanford, USC
Beautiful Minds: Dolphins, Apes and the origins of Human Intelligence
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August 3, 2018: Dr. Ted Cranford, San Diego State University
"That's Impossible!" Cetacean Heads are Vibroacoustic Antennas

June 1, 2018: Dr. Christine Whitcraft, California State University, Long Beach
Designing solutions to restore wetlands in a time of change
To watch a video of the lecture click here.

April 6, 2018: Dr. Karen Martin, Pepperdine University
Surf, Sand, and Silversides: Research and Outreach with California Grunion
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