Spatial and Temporal Scales of Human Disturbance McMurdo Station, Antarctica USAP Longterm Environme

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Spatial and Temporal Scales of Human
DisturbanceMcMurdo Station, AntarcticaUSAP
Long-term Environmental Monitoring
ProgramSummary and Future Directions

• Texas AM University, College Station, TX, United
  States
• University of Texas, Port Aransas, TX, United
  States

Presentation made to the Office of Polar
Programs National Science Foundation October,
13 2006
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• Value-Added Activities
• Presentations 19 - International and National
  Conferences, Workshops, Departmental Seminars,
  High Schools, and McMurdo Station
• Publications 11 Published, Accepted,
  In-preparation
• Reports 5
• News Article 2
• Journals, K-12 Education, TEA, and Awards

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• Journals

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• K-12 Education

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• Teachers Experiencing Antarctica (TEA)

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• Ethel Ashworth-Tsutsui Memorial Award

Established to honor women graduate students,
postdoctoral researchers and research staff who
take action to encourage and support women
graduate students at Texas AM University
Dianna Gielstra 2000 Mentor Award
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• Summary of Conclusions
• SEE SUMMARY OF CONCLUSIONS IN THE HANDOUTS

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• Monitoring Design Limitations
• Once a year sampling - potential to miss short
  term variations and events after the sampling.
• Two-dimensional - the vertical variations in
  contaminants may be significant in some locations
  (WQB)
• Spatial coverage in WQB - depth limited by diver
  access and spatial coverage by difficult sampling
  conditions
• Little or no sampling of ice covered areas on and
  offshore, air, or water quality (presumed in the
  latter two cases to be minor but may need
  occasional checking)
• Controls - particularly in the marine setting

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• Potential Future Directions
• Sampling areas before and after construction
  projects or other major activities.
• Expand monitoring to other locations, i.e.,
  Palmer Station, McMurdo Dry Valleys.
• Develop additional fingerprints to better define
  the sources and history of local contaminants
• Additional assays for contaminants associated
  with human activities.

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• Potential Future Directions (cont.)
• More accurately define long range transport of
  contaminants to better discern local sources,
  i.e., air sampling program.
• Analysis of opportunistic terrestrial animal and
  plant tissues for uptake and biomagnification.
• On-location microbial degradation experiments
  to determine contaminant half-lives.

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• THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION!
• QUESTIONS????