During the recent 2012 Ocean Sciences meeting held in Salt Lake City, Utah, 12 undergraduate students presented eight studies during a poster session on emerging research on the global ocean and society, including science education, outreach and public policy.

In addition to student contributions, faculty members from the College of Charleston and Gray's Reef National Marine Sanctuary staff presented a poster titled “Temporal variations in bathymetry and morphology at Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary”.

NOAA’s Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary, located on the mid-continental shelf off the Georgia coast, was initially mapped in 2001 to elucidate understanding of important marine habitats and provide means to conceptualize the recent and ancient geologic history of the southeastern United States continental shelf. New multibeam data were collected during a 2011 research expedition on the NOAA Ship Nancy Foster and was used to better understand how the bathymetry of Gray’s Reef has changed over time. Data processing and three-dimensional imagery were performed using CARIS HIPS and SIPS and backscatter data were analyzed to characterize bottom hardness and sediment texture. Additional comparative analysis of 2001 and 2011 datasets using BASE Editor is underway and will be presented at CARIS 2012.

The poster can also be found on our website under The Projects section of our Academic Partnering web pages.