Along with nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus, iron is essential for the growth of microscopic phytoplankton in the ocean. However, a new study led by oceanographers at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa with collaborators at the 91̽�� revealed that iron released from industrial processes, such as coal combustion and steelmaking, is altering the ecosystem in the North Pacific Transition Zone. This region, just north of Hawai‘i, is important for fisheries in the Pacific. 

The was published June 2 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

“We were able to see a connection between human activities and the location of key ecosystem boundaries in the ocean that are important for marine organisms,” said co-author , a 91̽��associate professor of oceanography. “I hope this research highlights that human activities can impact the ocean in multiple ways, not just through changes in the climate. I think it also highlights the importance of tracking key ocean ecosystem boundaries over time, so we can better understand how this might impact marine organisms.”

Iron from human activities billows into the atmosphere and can be carried to distant lands or oceans before it’s scrubbed from the skies by rain. Industrial iron has previously been detected in the North Pacific Transition Zone, but it was unclear what effect the iron had on the ecosystem.

To piece together the seasonal cycle of iron input, phytoplankton growth and ocean mixing, the researchers analyzed water and phytoplankton samples and studied ocean dynamics during four different expeditions to this region of the Pacific Ocean. They also assessed the iron in these waters to determine whether it had the unique isotope signature of iron that is released from industrial processes. 

The team found that phytoplankton in the region are iron-deficient during the spring, so an increase in the supply of iron boosts the spring phytoplankton bloom that is typical in the area. However, as a result of a booming bloom, they deplete other nutrients more quickly, leading to a crash in phytoplankton later in the season. Importantly, the iron isotope signature did, in fact, indicate the presence of industrial iron out in the Pacific, thousands of miles away from its source.

“The ocean has boundaries that are invisible to us but known to all sorts of microbes and animals that live there,” said , lead author and assistant professor at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology. “The North Pacific Transition Zone is one of these boundaries. It divides the low-nutrient ocean gyres from the high-nutrient temperate ecosystems to the North. With more iron coming into the system, that boundary is migrating north, but we are also expecting to see these boundaries shift northward as the ocean warms.”

That’s not necessarily all bad, Hawco said. But unfortunately, the regions of the transition zone that are closer to Hawai‘i are among those that are losing out. 

“It’s a one-two punch: Industrial iron is impacting the base of the food web and the warming of the ocean is pushing these phytoplankton-rich waters further and further away from Hawai‘i,” Hawco said.

The research team is developing new techniques to monitor the iron nutrition of ocean plankton. This will shed light on how changes in iron supply, from both natural or industrial sources, could impact ocean life. 

“A project of this scale is truly the result of collaboration between scientists with diverse expertise,” said co-author , a 91̽��research scientist in oceanography. “Thanks to these collaborations, we were able to integrate satellite observations — which reveal large-scale, multi-year trends — with ship-based data collected over several years at the same locations. This integration allowed us to link broad environmental patterns with the fine-scale molecular details of gene expression in key organisms responding to iron availability. Individually, each dataset is valuable, but together, they provide the depth and resolution needed to generate robust, predictive insights into ecosystem dynamics.”

Other 91̽��co-authors are and . See the paper for a .

This study was funded by the Simons Foundation and National Science Foundation. 

This story is adapted from a by the University of Hawai‘i Mānoa School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology.

The blue whale is the largest animal on the planet. It consumes enormous quantities of tiny, shrimp-like animals known as krill to support a body of up to 100 feet (30 meters) long. Blue whales and other baleen whales, which filter seawater through their mouths to feed on small marine life, once teemed in Earth’s oceans. Then over the past century they were hunted almost to extinction for their energy-dense blubber.

As whales were decimated, some thought the krill would proliferate in predator-free waters. But that’s not what happened. Krill populations dropped, too, and neither population has yet recovered.

A recent theory proposes that whales weren’t just predators in the ocean environment. Nutrients that whales excreted may have provided a key fertilizer to these marine ecosystems.

Research led by 91̽�� oceanographers supports that theory. It finds that whale excrement contains significant amounts of iron, a vital element that is often scarce in ocean ecosystems, and nontoxic forms of copper, another essential nutrient that in some forms can harm life.

The open-access , the first to look at the forms of these trace metals in what’s commonly known as whale poop, was published in January in Communications Earth & Environment.

“We made novel measurements of whale feces to assess how important whales are to recycling important nutrients for phytoplankton,” said first author , a 91̽��doctoral student in oceanography. “Our analysis suggests that the decimation of baleen whale populations from historical whaling could have had larger biogeochemical implications for the Southern Ocean, an area crucially important to global carbon cycling.”

The Southern Ocean encircling Antarctica harbors little human life but is thought to play an important role in the global climate. Strong circumpolar currents bring deep ocean water up to the surface. Huge blooms of plant-like organisms known as phytoplankton support populations of krill, which are still harvested in unprotected waters today for aquaculture and pet food.

To investigate what role whale poop may have played in this ecosystem, the study analyzed five stool samples. Two samples were from humpback whales in the Southern Ocean and three were from blue whales off the central Californian coast. The samples were collected when researchers out studying whale populations saw an opportunity.

“The nice thing, I guess, is that whale excrement floats,” said senior author , an assistant professor of oceanography at the UW. Researchers collect it using a net attached to a jar to collect the substance typically found as a slushy or slurry material.

“The hypothesis is that the whales were actually adding nutrients to the ecosystem that these phytoplankton were able to use, so they would bloom more and then the krill could eat them,” Bundy said.

Previous research had found significant amounts of , like nitrogen and carbon, in whale poop samples. The new paper instead looked for metals that are in short supply far from land and are often a limiting factor for the growth of ocean ecosystems.

“In the Southern Ocean, iron is considered to be one of the most scarce, or limiting, nutrients that phytoplankton need to survive,” Bundy said

Results showed iron was present in all the samples. The researchers also found another metal, copper.

“We were really shocked by how much copper was in the whale poop. We initially thought, ‘oh, no, is the whale poop actually toxic?’” Bundy said.

Further analysis showed that organic molecules known as attached to the copper atoms transformed them into a form that is safe for marine life. Other ligands helped make the iron accessible to living organisms. The researchers don’t yet know the source of the ligands but suspect they may come from bacteria in the whales’ stomachs.

Bundy’s research focuses on trace metals in the ocean environment. This project began as Monreal’s introductory research project as a graduate student but it grew into a larger endeavor as the results came in.

“I think animals play a larger role in chemical cycles than many experts give them credit for, especially when thinking at the ecosystem scale,” Monreal said. “When I say animals, I really mean their gut microbiome. Based on what we see, it seems like bacteria in the whales’ guts could be important.”

Co-authors are postdoctoral researcher , former doctoral student and former undergraduate student from the UW; Matthew Savoca and Jeremy Goldbogen at Stanford University; Lydia Babcock-Adams at Florida State University; Logan Pallin, Ross Nichols and Ari Friedlaender at the University of California, Santa Cruz; John Calambokidis at the Cascadia Research Collective in Olympia, Washington; and at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the UW’s Cooperative Institute for Climate, Ocean and Ecosystem Studies. Funders are MAC3 Impact Philanthropies, the MUIR Program at the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment, the 91̽�� Program on Climate Change and the Ford Foundation.

For more information, contact Monreal at pmonreal@uw.edu and Bundy at rbundy@uw.edu. Note: Monreal is on New Zealand time through mid-February and responses may be delayed.

Headed into her final year of law school, Mary Ruffin had planned to spend the summer at a private law firm, where she had secured an internship – a near rite of passage, among law students, to future employment.

But the internship, for college students in so many industries, was put on hold, the victim of the COVID-19 economy that has left millions out of work nationwide.

Yet Ruffin was undeterred, and she started reaching out to fellow students, faculty, alumni and attorneys to see what might be available – any kind of legal research or project to keep her skills sharp and her resume competitive.

In the meantime, faculty and administrators with the 91̽�� School of Law were working with local law firms to find solutions for the dozens of students in need of the professional development experience that defines the summers between years of law school and often leads to a full-time job. Together, they came up with the COVID-19 Clearinghouse, a collection of short-term, remote, pro bono projects for private firms and nonprofits that mainly address legal questions specific to life during the pandemic. And through the Clearinghouse, Ruffin received her first assignment for a client: researching employment laws for essential workers and their families.

“A lot of students go into law school because law can have a profound impact on people’s lives,” Ruffin said. “This seemed like a really good use of our time, when things are constantly changing, and it’s good for students to get involved and feel like we’re part of a community.”

The COVID-19 Clearinghouse is just one of the ways that faculty and staff across the 91̽��have revamped summer research internships and worked with outside partners and employers to involve students in a remote working environment, even for jobs that would normally be out in the field.

Bringing the outside in

Transforming what are usually outdoor or in-the-lab tasks has required creativity. Just ask almost anyone in the College of the Environment.

The Joint Institute for the Study of the Atmosphere and Ocean’s nine-week research internship program accepts about a dozen undergraduates from around the country. Students are paired with a project that’s meant to match their interests, either on the 91̽��campus with a faculty member, or at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration offices in Seattle. The cohort is housed in 91̽��residence halls, participates in regular activities and goes on the occasional field trip.

Not this year. All 10 interns will work remotely, some on projects that were reconfigured to be online, and a few who agreed to take a remote project that was completely different from what program administrator Jed Thompson would have offered, pre-pandemic.

Gone, for example, is any assignment involving the always-popular “ship time.” But time on the computer provides valuable skills, too, useful for oceanography and so many other science fields.

Both and , faculty in the School of Oceanography, have converted internships that would otherwise have been out on the water or inside in the lab. Instead of examining zooplankton for Keister or using mass spectrometers to measure metals in water for Bundy, the interns will analyze data from previously obtained samples, learning new computer programs and other means of identification and measurement.

Elsewhere in the College of the Environment, Washington Sea Grant’s science communication fellow would normally spend much of their time bringing safety and water-quality messages directly to the people – literally, surveying boaters, promoting education at festivals and sharing materials at docks and marinas. But until lockdown restrictions loosen significantly, assistant director for communications MaryAnn Wagner said, the fellowship is steering toward writing and social media: from press releases about marine debris disposal and pump-out stations, to tweets of recipes and sea-life trivia.

Adapting alongside employers

Many internships and practicum experiences rely on other partners and agencies. And as the reality of the pandemic and remote working arrangements became clear, 91̽��faculty and staff started contacting their usual job sites to determine what, if anything, could be modified.

The Program on the Environment requires its environmental studies majors to complete a year-long capstone project that includes a winter or summer field component, pairing students with outside organizations such as the Environmental Protection Agency and King County, said , a senior lecturer and the program’s capstone instructor. But ahead of the summer, some of the smaller nonprofit partners tightened their budgets, leaving some job sites unavailable.

“A huge selling point is that we embed students in these organizations, and largely, all that has disappeared,” McDonald said.

About one-third of students decided to postpone to a later quarter, while the remaining 21 students are pressing on with a summer assignment, albeit a remote one. The program’s job fair proceeded via Zoom, with students “meeting” prospective employers in breakout rooms.

In the School of Public Health’s dietetic program, graduate students are training to become registered dietitians, primarily destined for hospitals, clinics and public health settings. Students complete seven rotations, including at least one stint in a health care facility, and one stint in a concentration area such as public policy, school nutrition or public health practice.

But during the pandemic, the placements in health care settings are in flux, and program director has been working on ways to provide students the experiences they need to graduate this summer. For some students, this meant completing a second public health rotation and delaying the start of clinical work. An entire cohort of dietitian students, nationwide, is in the same boat, she said.

“Our dietetic program has taken an individualized approach to meet students’ educational and career goals,” Lund said. “We’re doing everything we can but there are still gaps in their experiences due to the pandemic. It’s a system-level problem, and the system needs to recognize that and respond with post-credentialing training opportunities.”

Partnering around the pandemic

The quest to secure employment after law school begins early: The summer between the first and second years is the “resume-building” internship that leads to the more career-focused second summer, when a successful experience at a firm or organization often ensures a job there after graduation.

Establishing the COVID-19 Clearinghouse was a collective effort, led by 91̽��Law administrators and faculty, in consultation with alumni, retired attorneys, the Washington State Bar Association and several local firms, primarily Foster Garvey in Seattle. The pandemic had begun to generate many legal questions, and with the disappearance of so many paid jobs for law students, was there a way to address some of these issues, provide pro bono legal services to communities in need, and give students some of the experiences and skills practice they might get in a summer internship?

“There is a confluence of community need and student need,” said professor , 91̽��Law’s associate dean for experiential education, who collaboratively oversees the Clearinghouse with , co-chair of Foster Garvey’s pro bono committee. “We’re trying to take an otherwise challenging experience for students and turn it into a learning experience that builds their skills and enhances their future job prospects.”

The Clearinghouse matches students with supervising pro bono attorneys to tackle COVID-19 research projects that qualified legal service providers don’t have the capacity to undertake.  The matching is coordinated through a series of Google surveys: one for legal service providers to submit questions and projects they want students to address; another for attorneys who want to volunteer their time to student teams; a third for students to indicate their areas of interest.  To date, 66 91̽��law students have volunteered their time and skills.

The law schools at Seattle University and Gonzaga University joined the effort, and now there are 14 active projects involving dozens of students, many from the UW.

Mary Ruffin’s assignment with Foster Garvey is one of the projects that have concluded. Under the supervision of attorney Mikaela Louie, a 91̽��Law alum, Ruffin and students Ysabel Mullarky and Dailey Koga tackled the employment rights of essential workers who live with people at high risk of the COVID-19 infection. The final product was a memo for the client, the Northwest Justice Project, to use in counseling people in need of legal advice.

As society adjusts to the new normal of the pandemic, these opportunities for community engagement can continue, said Damon-Feng, who was key to facilitating the Clearinghouse and creating a list of project needs.

“Moving forward, when students may not be getting the employment experiences they need, we hope that we can get them experiences and skills training through the Clearinghouse,” Damon-Feng said. “The Clearinghouse is also helping to meet increased need from the nonprofit and legal services community. And from the law firm side, we want to contribute to these efforts and get more people involved in this work.”

91̽��Law faculty have developed a summer course, too: “Lawyering in the Time of COVID-19,” designed to provide students with a substantive overview of big-picture issues, as well as skill development. The course will be taught in modules related to legal issues central to the pandemic, such as immigration and detention, unemployment, criminal justice and detention, and small-business issues. The second half of the course will pair students with local practitioners to work on a project or case in their area of expertise. Whether through opportunities with the Clearinghouse, or in the classroom, faculty say, students have a chance to learn about the law as it relates to an unprecedented event.

It’s not the summer experience that students expected, said , the law school’s interim assistant dean for student and career services. But a can-do attitude can help.

“Students gain key legal skills through a variety of experiences, and students should remember to stay focused on continuing to learn, even if their summers don’t look how they hoped. Remember — this is just one small time in your very long career,” she said.