REU Site: Ocean Coastal Zone Sustainability through University of Southern California Wrigley Institute for Environmental Studies

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The University of Southern California's Wrigley Institute of Environmental Science will host a Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) site that will provide eight students with a ten-week active learning experience each summer for three years. Students will spend several days at the start of the summer at the USC University Park Campus (UPC) in Los Angeles for orientation, training and project development, then will move to the USC Wrigley Marine Science Center (WMSC) on Catalina Island where they will conduct a summer research project in collaboration with faculty, other students and staff. They will then return to the UPC campus at the end of the summer to participate in a joint undergraduate research symposium. In addition to research training, students will participate in targeted professional development including training in science communication, research ethics, the graduate school and job application process, and networking in the marine sciences. Students will also have opportunities to take on leadership roles in large-scale outreach activities for other undergraduates, high school students, and the general public conducted by the USC Wrigley Institute on Catalina Island.The WMSC REU Site will provide a total of twenty-four undergraduates with internships over the three-year period. The program conducts a national search for applicants and seeks to engage students who are from schools with limited research opportunities. Most of the funding provided supports student stipends, housing and travel to attend the program. The range of potential research projects for REU students at WMSC is highly varied with a general focus on ocean environments at the land-ocean interface. Prior REU projects have been centered around organismal biology, marine ecology, biogeochemical cycling, marine microbial ecology, biology of invasive species, fisheries population ecology, trace element chemistry, land use impacts, predator/prey studies, population genetics, environmental contamination, and organism toxicity. Through these types of research experiences paired with specific skills training sessions, students will gain an understanding of interactions between land and coastal oceans processes. This project supports national goals of developing the next generation of scientists and the scientific workforce.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.