Seawater system utilization improvements at the Shannon Point Marine Center

Western Washington University, Bellingham WA

Investigators

Abstract

A grant has been awarded to Western Washington University, under the direction of Dr Stephen Sulkin to support renovation and expantion of seawater facilities for experimental marine research and education at Shannon Point Marine Center (SPMC). Improvements to be made include: renovation and redesign of the sea water tables that occupy the 900 sq ft wet laboratory that is the principal holding area for live marine biota; new outdoor tanks in an area that receives natural sunlight; extension of the system to provide running seawater in a room in an existing laboratory that will become an additional instructional laboratory; and installation of instrumentation to improve monitoring of water quality parameters on a site-specific basis. Provision of high quality running seawater of adequate capacity and access is essential to virtually all of the research and instructional programs at Shannon Point marine Center (SPMC). A proper seawater system should permit marine science classes offered at SPMC to make collections and bring the material back to the classroom/lab for careful study; provide us the ability to make advance collections for main campus classes that come to SPMC on time-limited field trips, as well as for classes coming from other colleges on field trips; allow for the maintenance of plants and animals and for the spawning of larvae for use in experimental research; and permit application of proper experimental design directly in a flowing seawater environment. These are fundamental functions that support virtually all resident and visiting scientists and students who use SPMC as the site of their research and training activities.