Is global warming causing marine diseases to spread?

I recently attended the Oceans Sciences Meeting 2016 in New Orleans, USA (blog to come!) to present in a session called 'Scaling Up: Marine Infectious Diseases from the Molecule to the Ecosystem'. I met a group of really cool disease-y people who recently contributed to a special issue in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B; ‘Marine disease’. I decided to pitch an idea to The Conversation, a news website with 'academic rigour' with the hope of gaining more attention for the important subject of marine disease.

The article, below, was a huge success, with over 6000 hits so far and was picked up by IFLScience, Science Rocks my World and the Portland Press Herald amongst other news outlets.  The Conversation believe in the free flow of information and use a Creative Commons Attribution No Derivatives licence, so you can republish our articles for free, online or in print!

Is global warming causing marine diseases to spread?

by Charlotte Eve Davies, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)

Global climate change is altering the world’s oceans in many ways. Some impacts have received wide coverage, such as shrinking Arctic sea ice, rising sea levels and ocean warming. However, as the oceans warm, marine scientists are observing other forms of damage.

My research focuses on diseases in marine ecosystems. Humans, animals and plants are all susceptible to diseases caused by bacteria, viruses, parasites and fungi. Marine diseases, however, are an emerging field.

Infectious agents have the potential to alter ocean life in many ways. Some threaten our food security by attacking important commercial species, such as salmon. Others, such as bacteria in oysters, may directly harm human health. Still others damage valuable marine ecosystems – most notably coral reefs. To anticipate these potential problems, we need a better understanding of marine diseases and how climate change affects their emergence and spread.

Warming waters promote marine diseases

Recent studies show that for some marine species diseases are spreading and increasing. Climate change may also promote the spread of infectious agents in oceans. Notably, warming water temperatures can expand these agents' ranges and introduce diseases to areas where they were previously unknown.

Many diseases of marine species are secondary opportunist infections that take advantage when a host organism is stressed by other conditions, such as changes in pH, salinity or temperature. A bacterium that is dormant (and therefore noninfective) at a certain temperature may thrive at a slightly higher temperature.

One well-documented example is the emergence of epizootic shell disease (ESD) in American lobsters. This disease, thought to be caused by bacteria, is characterized by lesions that penetrate inward from a lobster’s shell surface towards the inner flesh, making infected lobsters unmarketable. ESD can also kill lobsters by making it difficult for them to shed their shells in order to grow.

An American lobster with epizootic shell disease (ESD). para_sight/flickr

In the 1990s, following almost a decade of above-normal summer temperatures, ESD affected so many lobsters that the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission declared that the Southern New England fishery (Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York and Rhode Island) was in collapse and recommended closing it. Fishery models that incorporated shell disease offered convincing evidence that ESD was a major factor in the decline of the stock. This episode underscores the importance of considering marine diseases in stock assessments and fishery management.

Now there are concerns that ESD will continue to spread north to Maine’s US$465.9 million lobster fishery. In 2015 the Gulf of Maine showed record high abundances of lobster, making it one of the most productive fisheries in the world.

However, sea surface temperatures in the Gulf of Maine have increased faster than 99 percent of the global ocean over the past decade, warming three times faster than the global average. Since temperature is a primary factor in the spread of this disease, observers fear that it could have devastating effects on Maine’s lobster fishery.

There is also a risk that ESD could spread from American lobsters to other fisheries. Seafood wholesalers have imported live American lobsters into Europe for decades, which can result in their escape into the wild. Last summer the United Kingdom’s Marine Management Organization warned U.K. fishermen that because the European lobster shares similar habitats, food sources and diseases with the American lobster, ESD could spread between the species.

As a doctoral student at Swansea University, U.K., I collaborated with the New England Aquarium in Boston, Massachusetts to investigate this possibility. While we found that European lobsters were more likely to develop shell disease when reared in the presence of American lobsters, on the positive side, they don’t seem to get the same shell disease as American lobsters.

This means that European lobsters may be better equipped to deal with outbreaks of ESD. But with sea surface temperatures in U.K. coastal waters rising since the 1980s by around 0.2-0.9 degrees Celsius per decade, it is important to monitor U.K. waters for this disease.

European lobsters with mild, none and severe shell disease. Andrew Rowley/Swansea University

Tropical disease

Now I am now studying the Panuliris argus_1 virus (PaV1) in the Caribbean spiny lobster, where the picture is more dire. Discovered around 2000, this virus is present from the Florida Keys to Venezuela. It can infect up to 60 percent of lobsters in some areas. Laboratory studies indicate that lobsters held in high-temperature seawater and exposed to PaV1 develop active and more intense infections much more quickly than those held at lower temperatures.

Studies from 1982 to 2012 show that waters in the Caribbean are warming, with the most significant temperature increase occurring over the past 15 years – approximately the period when PaV1 appeared. If PaV1 continues to spread, it could have significant effects on the health of Caribbean reefs as a whole, as well as on the valuable Caribbean lobster fishery.

Monitoring more diseases

Many other species are also showing increasing effects from marine diseases. The frequency of coral diseases has increased significantly over the last 10 years, causing widespread mortality among reef-building coral, which are home to more than 25 percent of all marine fish species.

In the Pacific, more than 20 species of sea stars were devastated by a wasting disease that ranged from Mexico all the way up to Alaska in 2013 and 2014. Research suggests that 90 percent of some populations were wiped out, and some adult populations have been reduced to a quarter of pre-outbreak numbers.

Scientists believe the cause is a virus which becomes more active in warmer conditions. In both field surveys and laboratory experiments, starfish were found to react faster to the disease in warmer water than in cooler temperatures.

Starfish on the shore at Umpqua Lighthouse State Park - Winchester Bay, Oregon. skipplitt/flickr

As the oceans continue to warm, it is crucial to understand how our actions are affecting marine life. Some species will not be able to withstand the increase in temperature. The most recent U.S. National Climate Change Assessment projects that outbreaks of marine diseases are likely to increase in frequency and severity as waters warm under climate change. Researchers are working around the world to determine whether and how species will survive disease events in our increasingly altered oceans.

Charlotte Eve Davies, Postdoctoral Researcher at the Institute of Marine Sciences and Limnology, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Mojito.... I mean... Puerto Rico!

I seem to have gone on a rampage about lobster blood over my last few posts. I will relieve you of the science with a tale of some exciting sunny marine biology!

As some of you know, as well as my research, I work at Swansea University as a part-time teaching assistant, and last year the university started it’s new Tropical Ecology Field Course, in Puerto Rico. Now, as most of you will not know, over the past year I have been in talks with a university in Mexico about applying (and indeed applying for) a postdoc. I found out in October that I got the funding for the project and I have been planning my departure from Swansea. However, I decided to go out with a bang and volunteered as a member of staff for the field course in Puerto Rico (hard life, I know). My Caribbean Sea-life knowledge wasn’t really up to scratch so I thought this would be an excellent chance to get to grips with what will probably be the next two years of my life. The trip was lead by Dr. Richard Unsworth (seagrass lover extraordinaire) and Nicole Esteban (sea turtle expert) in addition to Dr. Ed Pope (of PhD viva fame), Dr. Ian Horsfall (sea cucumber hugger) and Dr. Penny Neyland (plant fondler…. hang on, what’s she doing there?! Tehe)

So, in the early hours of a cold January morning we set off from Swansea, armed with foldable quadrats, dissection trays and bikinis (all the essentials... ya know). After a 4-hour coach to Heathrow, a flight to Houston Texas (where we may or may not have left the bags on the luggage carousel and Ed may or may not have tried to exit the airport without the students).. another flight to San Juan, and another 3-hour coach we arrived in the little town of La Parguera and our home for the two weeks; Isla Magueyes Field Station. Which by the way, was just a field station, on an island. I was picturing a larger island, with roads and stuff (as were some of the officers at the American immigration apparently, when they tried to get some students to write a street address.. another story!)… it was paradise.

There were a few iguanas.

Luckily, Rich and Nicole had been there for a few days already getting everything ready for our grand arrival (oh yeah, did I mention we were bringing 22 students as well?). We had a briefing in the classroom followed by an introductory snorkel. Although at the time not everybody was up for it, this was probably the best idea - we had been travelling all night and most of us were zombies but if left to our own devices we would have just slept and jet-lag would have ruled!

The first ‘official’ day was snorkelling practise from the various wharfs and docks around the island, with a fish measurement and biomass estimation activity, whereby we set out a line of wooden fish (lovingly transported by students last year) which we knew the size of, and the students had up to 3 tries to improve their guesses. This is really important for things like AGRRA surveys where you can use the length of a specific species to estimate it’s biomass using info freely available on FishBase. Other activities were fish ID (self explanatory), fish behaviour (trying to follow a fish for a few minutes is HARD), fish species and fish abundance, where students experienced the difficulty in estimating fish abundance underwater. 

Day three involved boat based snorkelling… now here let me introduce you to something essential that we all loved to hate. An SMB, or surface marker buoy... is, as the name suggests.. a buoy which marks the surface where a diver/snorkeller is underneath the water. In a tourist hotspot like Isla Magueyes and around, these were essential for safety.. but sometimes.. they got in the way. Now, not naming any names… but I’m pretty sure that we didn’t end the week with all the SMBs we started with (I’m looking at you, Jack.. Elizabeth…). Having an SMB entangle itself around your neck/snorkel/weight-belt, let me tell you, is not a nice experience... but neither is Richards face when you have to tell him you tried to tie one to a rock then lost it! Anyway, SMBs aside.. today we used the carefully re-assembled quadrats to look at percentage cover of corals, sponges, algae, seagrass (because nope, they are not the same thing) plus the invertebrates on the seabed.. in both the day and the night (spooky!!). This activity essentially taught me how bad my coral ID skills were but hey! I had another week to improve. And to play with the territorial damselfish... 

The next couple of days were based on teaching and learning AGRRA. AGRRA, or to use it’s full name; Atlantic and Gulf Rapid Reef Assessment is a technique used to assess coral reef benthos. This includes understanding how to assess coral reef health, and for our students, to assess coral reef health of reefs in Puerto Rico by examining how the biota of healthy reefs changes as they become degraded. There is also a technique for assessing coral reef fish assemblages, which applies the knowledge of reef fish we developed on day 1 to assess coral reef fish communities in Puerto Rico. Again, we used it to examine how the fish communities of healthy reefs change as they become degraded. Now obviously, our surveys were small, but when used for research projects, these techniques are widely comparable and are used by scientists in Universities, Government and NGO’s for assessing coral reef health in Caribbean and Pacific.

Early morning commute to the sampling sites. Life is hard.

Even though it was a marine ecology field course, a super important part of tropical marine ecosystems are mangroves. So, under the supervision of our resident plant lover Penny, we headed out to Laguna Monsio José to learn about these fascinating ecosystems.. because yes, although a mangrove tree is a plant, the forests mangroves form are among the most productive and biologically complex ecosystems on Earth. As described in this great NatGeo article.. “birds roost in the canopy, shellfish attach themselves to the roots, and snakes and crocodiles come to hunt. Mangroves provide nursery grounds for fish; a food source for monkeys, deer, tree-climbing crabs, and a nectar source for bats and honeybees”. As well as squelching through the mangrove mud, we snorkelled through the roots to check out diversity of fish that live there... maybe plants are pretty cool after all.

The students also learnt how to seine net.. and this was an interesting one. As marine biologists, they are lucky in the fact that they have already taken part in a field course in the UK (at the Field Centre in Orielton) so are familiar with netted species back home.. so here we did it at night and in the morning. Both of which I missed as I was asleep very busy science-ing. 

Now.. we also did a lionfish dissection. In the Caribbean, the lionfish (Pterois volitans) is invasive. That means, it's not supposed to be there. Native to the Indian Ocean, Southern and Western Pacific Ocean and the Red Sea, it is speculated that they were introduced to the Atlantic when released by "retired" aquarium enthusiasts. Luckily, cold water temperatures are keeping numbers at bay in the north, but this is not the case in the south where lionfish are spreading rapidly through the South Florida coast, the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. But so what? They are just fish right? Wrong. Lionfish are are voracious predators and non-selective feeders, with virtually no natural enemies due to their toxic spines. Studies have shown that a single lionfish can reduce juvenile fish populations by 79% in just 5 weeks. Wow.

We found some pretty cool stuff in our lion fish stomachs... including a mantis shrimp!!

Mantis shrimp! Fresh from a lionfish tummy

My favourite day by far had to be the seagrass sampling.  SeagrassWatch is the internationally recognised method for assessing seagrass meadows. It allows scientists to examine the differences between healthy and degraded seagrass meadows and our students were able to help establish a long-term seagrass monitoring site in Puerto Rico! If you are a marine scientist that is interested in taking part.. check out the manual here. 

Seagrass are important; like mangroves, they support whole ecosystems. The habitat complexity within seagrass meadows enhances the diversity and abundance of animals. Seagrasses on reef flats and near estuaries are also nutrient sinks, buffering or filtering nutrient and chemical inputs to the marine environment.... They also stabilise coastal sediments. Most important of all, they are a nursery for all sorts of reef critters... including my buddy, the spiny lobster. Below is a video of me doing what I do best, harassing a couple.

The last few days were reserved for the students to undertake their very own 'mini research projects'. These 5 projects ranged from tarpon behaviour... to abiotic driver of benthic composition, the latter of which I was lucky enough to take part in! 

A-team. 

Overall, a great week was had by all. I can say that although I went as a member of staff, I was constantly learning and I feel safe in the knowledge that I now know my squirrelfish from my angelfish. A must, if you plan on undertaking a postdoc in the Caribbean... (but more of that in my next post!)

Crabs, parasites and other wonderful afflictions

So it's been a while since my last blog post... I know! Since finishing my PhD in January it's been a hectic 6 months. I have been busy writing up some bits and bobs from my thesis which weren't quite published.. and you will all be excited to hear that my research has moved a little towards the crabby side... (groan!).

For one of my PhD chapters, I looked at a disease called Hematodinium. Well, more of a parasite than a disease, this dinoflagellate infects over 40 species of decapod crustaceans worldwide. But not lobsters of the clawed kind, apparently.... I set out to test this theory.

So a bit of background. What is a parasite? According to the dictionary; "noun an organism which lives in or on another organism (its host) and benefits by deriving nutrients at the other's expense." There are different types of parasites, endo (those that live within an organism) and ecto (those which live outside of one). An example of an ectoparasite, is the 'lobster louse'; endoparasitic copepod Nicothoe astaci, another critter I have worked extensively on and may have mentioned in the past. In my lab, we have worked on it's histological morphology, revealing the point of attachment to the lobster, surface morphology revealing the attachment mechanism and the effects of the parasite upon the host.

Anyway, back to the parasite at hand. As an endoparasite, Hematodinium live inside the host, specifically in the haemolymph (blood)... pretty grim I know. A couple of French scientists Chatton and Poisson first reported the disease in France in both harbour Liocarcinus depurator and shore crabs Carcinus maenas in the 1930s. It has since been found to infect over 40 species of decapod crustaceans worldwide, and because infected animals become unmarketable due to poor muscle quality, Hematodinium spp. infections have had huge economic impacts on commercial fisheries. For example, in France, the velvet swimming crab Necora puber fishery suffered a catastrophic collapse (>96 %) due to Hematodinium spp. in 1985. In the US, outbreaks of Hematodinium spp. have infected up to a third of the Tanner crab Chionoecetes bairdi and snow crab Chionoecetes opilio stocks in southeast Alaska and Newfoundland respectively and in Virginia, loss to the blue crab Callinectes sapidus fishery is estimated to be between 0.5 and 1 million USD per year. In the UK, the Scottish Nephrops fishery also loses approximately £2-4 GBP million annually due to Hematodinium spp. infection.

There are only two species of Hematodinium that have been described so far. This is due to their lack of distinct characteristics and poorly understood life cycles. The type species, Hematodinium perezi, was first described from the crabs on the Normandy and Mediterranean coast of France by our friends Chatton & Poisson in 1931. H. perezi, or a closely related species, has since been reported in epidemics from edible/brown crabs Cancer pagurus and velvet swimming crabs off Brittany, France, and from the English Channel. A second species, H. australis, was described from Australia and was separated from H. perezi on the basis of size of the vegetative stage (called a trophont), the presence of rounded plasmodial stages and the austral location.

My experiment, in a nutshell

So, why do I want to see if my beloved European lobsters are susceptible to infection? Judging by the above effects upon fisheries worldwide, it's an important critter to keep an eye on, and since it infects our native Cancer pagurus (edible, or brown crab), for me, that's a little too close for comfort! Edible crabs share habitats with European lobsters and are often found together in parlour pots (fishing traps) - often injured from some aggressive run ins. We know from my past research that injury can lead to disease and although Hematodinium infections have been found more in juvenile crabs, it is still an important issue. We don't know where the parasite resides before it enters the host, and so it is interesting to investigate the susceptibility of different species in order to further understand the infectivity.

In order to do this, we did two experiments, or 'exposure studies'.  First, we collected some edible crabs from the South Wales coast, from spots known to harbour Hematodinium infected crabs in the past, and inspected the blood for the parasite. Just to be sure, we kept them for a few weeks, checking every week for infective stage parasites. Once we were happy we had some crabs sufficiently 'infested' enough, we took live samples of Hematodinium by drawing the blood (haemolymph) and separating out the parasites into a clean saline solution. This solution was to be injected into our disease-free, juvenile European lobsters.

We first did a preliminary, or pilot, study, which was run side-by-side with a similar study artificially infecting edible crabs Cancer pagurus (just to be sure that the Hematodinium species we were injecting was viable). In the pilot, the crabs injected became infected after a matter of weeks, but the lobsters did not... However, the number of lobsters we used was small and we wanted to run a longer study with more sampling points, so we decided to try again. On the second attempt we took blood samples from the experimental (and control!) lobsters before injection, just after, 24h after, 1 week and then every month thereafter. The results were as expected... all negative (even the 24h post injection one!). To look for the parasites, we used microscopy (blood smears), polymerase chain reaction (PCR) with primers specific for Hematodinium spp. (yes, that's species, just in case!) and also histology from the final time point.

What is it that a lobster has and a crab doesn't? There have been some pretty cool molecular studies of late at a collaborators lab in Canada, looking at gene expression (i.e. what genes are expressed in disease animals vs. those which aren't diseased...) I think it would be really interesting to find out exactly what it is in the lobster immune response which renders it unable to maintain this infection.

Although we weren't surprised at our results, it is still an interesting study. It does seem that the EU lobster has something that other decapods don't. Another example is my earlier disease work where we looked at transmission of epizootic shell disease (ESD) from American lobsters into European ones... to no avail. It seems EU lobsters are the strong men of the lobster kingdom?

To read the full study, see the citation below (if you click the DOI, it will take you to a download page). If you can't access the papers, feel free to comment or email me and I can send you a copy.

Davies, C.E. and Rowley, A.F. (2015) Are European lobsters (Homarus gammarus) susceptible to infection by a temperate Hematodinium sp.?. Journal of Invertebrate Pathology 127, 6-10 doi: 10.1016/j.jip.2015.02.004

For further reading, my supervisor recently wrote a mini review on this interesting parasite...

Rowley, A.F., Smith, A.L. and Davies, C.E. (2015) How does the dinoflagellate parasite, Hematodinium outsmart the immune system of its crustacean hosts? PLOS Pathogens 11 (5), e1004724 doi: 10.1371/journal.ppat.1004724

The importance of understanding impacts of MPAs on population health and disease

I recently had a paper published in ICES Journal of Marine Science. It is going to be a part of a special issue for the 10th International Conference and Workshop on Lobster Biology and Management (10th ICWL) - this is the conference I attended in Mexico earlier this year.

The paper is entitled "Effects of population density and body size on disease ecology of the European lobster in a temperate marine conservation zone" and I am very excited about it! 

I wrote an article for the news website The Conversation which I have included below for your viewing pleasure!

"It has long been news that overfishing persists in many of the world’s oceans. Fish and invertebrate stocks have been over-exploited for our ever-hungry, growing human population, leaving some species in dangerous decline.

The establishment of marine protected areas (MPAs) across the globe has been hailed as the silver bullet for conservation, with reports of increased catch, and spillover of recovered populations into adjacent fisheries, helping to replenish overfished stocks. But there may be unintended consequences if these areas are left unchecked. As populations of certain species are restored, disease can increase too.

The Lundy Island Marine Conservation Zone
(Lundy Field Society)

Lundy Island, off the coast of Devon, was the UK’s first MPA. It was established as a marine nature reserve in 1986, incorporated a no take zone in 2003 and was designated a marine conservation zone in 2010.

Four years of monitoring from 2003 to 2007 saw a marked increase in commonly fished species, such as lobster, inside the no take zone when compared to fished areas.

But in 2010, a study of Lundy called for a cost-benefits review of marine reserves, after it was found that shell disease in European lobsters may be increasing inside the protected area, supposedly caused by the high density of certain species.

We returned to Lundy the following year to monitor the populations of European lobster. When we compared a fished area to the eight-year-old, unfished, no take zone, we found more abundant, and larger lobsters inside the no take zone

This phenomenon is a well known upshot of establishing MPAs and one of the reasons they are celebrated. Local fishermen agreed that since the no take zone was implemented, there has been an increase in catch around the area.

But in the same survey, we found that there was a higher probability of lobsters being injured inside the Lundy no take zone. Injury is thought to be induced by the European lobsters' aggressive and solitary nature, so naturally in areas of high density such as the no take zone we expected to find a lot. Still, injury is known to be a precursor to disease. The shell of a lobster is its first line of defence and once breached, this may give rise to entry of pathogens.

A lobster from Lundy Island with shell diseased claws.

This is crucial to understand because other studies have shown that pathogens in marine ecosystems are on the rise, a phenomenon which may be exacerbated by climate change.

In the past, disease in American lobsters is thought to have contributed to the collapse of a lobster fishery in southern Massachusetts. It is important to monitor disease and understand the effects on populations elsewhere in the world, especially those species which are commercially exploited.

Our study is interesting in that it introduces the idea that un-fished populations in marine parks may eventually reach a threshold at which conditions become unhealthy. This may even introduce the possibility of controlled fishing in long-standing no take zones.

Training fishermen in surveying techniques
at Lundy Island.

This may be a controversial move but studies have shown high abundance in marine reserves may render animals vulnerable to disease particularly because infections can no longer be “fished out”. A total ban on fishing is certainly positive in allowing recovery of populations back to unexploited densities, but they may have a finite time span of success.

There is no doubt that fishery closures and marine protected areas do help contribute to the conservation of species, but the important message here is that we must monitor them closely. In November 2013, the UK designated 27 new MPA sites. Monitoring species richness, abundance and disease in these areas will be crucial to avoid any unwanted byproducts such as disease increase."

Unfortunately, the paper isn't open access - but if you would like a copy, please get in touch with me at CEDavies72@gmail.com and I can send you a copy!

Conferences, PhD routes and funding for postgrad students!

So, I've been at it again... I'm sure all lobsterologists out there (and my close friends!) will have heard that the 10th International Conference and Workshop on Lobster Biology and Management (10th ICWL) is coming up, and this year it is in Cancun, Mexico. Aside from the amazing location, this is a 'must attend' conference for me, since it only happens every two years and as I am in the final year of my PhD I feel like it is a very important opportunity to make contacts, talk about my current work and even future collaborations. So, in true 'Charlotte' style, I have been on the hunt for travel grants..

'More grants?!' I hear you all ask... but yes, really, this is how I get by. I have mentioned this before, but I am a self-funded PhD student. Whilst most of my research is funded, as I have mentioned in previous blogs, I personally do not receive a 'stipend' like most PhD students would do traditionally. This means that I have had to work part time throughout my PhD in order to pay for food, rent and personal items. Before you ask, the bank of mum and dad closed a long time ago, for which I am extremely grateful - I have learnt to be careful, self sufficient and at the same time, developing my grant - application skills!

Why start a PhD that isn't fully funded? The answer to that is slightly complicated...  I started my PhD in a rather unusual manner; after graduating in 2011, I knew that I wanted to continue studying, preferably in a research environment, after having such a great time doing the work for my undergraduate dissertation. I applied for a fully funded MRes in Aquatic Ecology and Conservation, but found out on the day of my graduation that I didn't get the funding and I knew that doing it with none and paying my own fees would be excruciating. I know Professor Rowley, my supervisor, had a really cool project lined up, so I quickly applied for an MSc by Research in Aquatic Ecology, which was a new course that came with a £3000 bursary if you were successful, in order to help pay the fees. Luckily, I was successful and my masters began technically in August 2011, a month after graduation, when I volunteered with Dr. Emma Wootton, a post doc from my lab, on a research trip to Lundy Island, which was funded by Seafish.

Fresh from graduation, sampling on a fishing boat!

I'll take a minute here to explain the differences in 'Masters' courses. All masters, unlike undergraduate, are a full year, as opposed to the usual academic year of September - June. An MSc is a 'taught' masters, which means that it is very similar to your third year of undergraduate, in the sense that it is 2/3's taught (ie. lectures and exams), and 1/3 research (a dissertation, or thesis), which usually begins around June/July. MSc's are 'graded', much like an undergraduate degree but rather as a pass, merit or distinction. An MRes is the opposite, it is a 'pass or fail' masters, 1/3 taught, usually with exams in January, after which you begin your research project, which continues until the summer. An MSc by Research is a relatively new idea, it is much like the first year of a PhD (see where I'm going with this...?), in the sense that you start your research from day one, and it continues throughout the year. You don't usually have lectures or exams, however in my case I had to sit a 'skills and stats' module, for which there was a short exam in January. The outcome of this exam does not go towards the final grade, you merely have to pass it (50% or more) in order to continue with the masters.

For me, by May, I was thoroughly enjoying my research, and finding out some really cool stuff, but I couldn't help but notice that it didn't seem to be ending. The original project was going well, but there was also some unanswered questions, and some really cool follow up work which I wanted to do. Luckily, I was able to convert my masters to the first year of my PhD, which I wouldn't have been able to do if I was doing an MSc or an MRes, so that day when I didn't get the funding to do my original choice was a blessing in disguise! Andrew, my supervisor, did warn me that it would be difficult and to think carefully before I made a decision, but that he was able to pay my tuition fees, shared with my second supervisor in the school of medicine. I took the plunge.

This is where my journey into obtaining funding began. I found out that you can get funding from Grant Giving Trusts, which are organisations who help others, be it charities, institutions, NGOs or individuals, in the form of grants. I popped down to the local library and took out a copy of the Charities Aid Foundation 'Directory of Grant Making Trusts' to make some notes. What I found was unreal - there are thousands - and while some ask for a formal application, others just request a letter. I drafted around 20 letters and sent them out, I heard back from a few, but not all and some took months, so you need to be patient. I was eventually rewarded when I received a letter from the John Mathews Educational Charity with an offer of £1500 - it was more than I could have hoped for and really helped me get through the second year of my PhD.

Obviously part-time work helps, and during the second year of my PhD I worked part time in a pub in Swansea - however, this was only for about a year as I was tired all the time and when I couldn't get time off to go to an important Shellfish Association of Great Britain conference, I had to quit. I demonstrate within my department, which means helping out in undergraduate practicals, on field trips and sometimes even guest-lecturing. I also mark work, which includes practical and field trip write ups, essays and CVs. This work is dependent upon when I am needed by lecturers, so can fluctuate; as can my work as a student Ambassador, which involves helping out on open days talking to prospective students and their parents. Work is often seasonal at the university; in the past I have helped out on the clearing helplines for admissions and worked as an ambassador at a summer school. There is always work around if you can be motivated enough to find it - I know that there will always be something around the corner, even when times are tough.

I often get asked how I obtain my funding, or how I am 'so lucky'... really there is no luck involved, just a motivation to succeed and a passion for my research. You may or may not have noticed, but I LOVE my PhD and really care about my subject, which I hope comes through in my applications. I know exactly why it is important, maybe not to everyone, but to fishermen, pathologists and seafood lovers, it is!

For those I keep promising to write a list for, here it is! To date, a list and sources of all funding I have applied for and received (and some that I am ineligible for - but definitely recommend).

Marine Biological Association of Great Britain Travel Bursary to attend their 2013 10th Postgraduate Conference at Aberystwyth University. I was given £200 to attend, which paid for travel costs and accommodation for the week. This conference was invaluable and I also attended the 9th one at University College Cork in Ireland the previous year. Loads of postgrads from all over the UK attend, there is a really informal atmosphere, definitely worth it for Masters or PhD students - a great practice for larger conferences and great to meet people in similar fields. This year it was held at the Centre for Environmental and Marine Sciences on the Scarborough Campus of the University of Hull, definitely worth a look if you are a Masters or PhD student in marine biology.

The Educational Charity of John Mathews - An award of £1500 to assist in the costs of my PhD, The Educational Charity of John Mathews encourages applications from young people seeking to build upon their talents and improve their educational and career prospects.

Society of Biology Travel Grant - A £500 travel grant towards the start up of a new collaboration between University of Prince Edward Island Lobster Science Centre and Swansea University, which is the reason I started this blog!

Climate Change Consortium of Wales Travel Bursary - A £500 travel bursary toward the start up of a collaboration between the University of Prince Edward Island, Canada, and Swansea University, looking into shellfish disease affecting both European and American lobsters and how climate change may be displacing lobster populations (more about this in my next blog!)

Society of Experimental Biology via the Company of Biologists - A £500 travel grant in order to present at the 10th International Conference and Workshop on Lobster Biology and Management in Cancun, Mexico.

Challenger Society for Marine Science - A travel grant of £250, again, to assist towards costs of presenting at the 10th ICWL in Mexico.

The British Ecological Society Training and Travel Grant - I was awarded £465.92 again, to assist towards the cost of presenting at the 10th ICWL - Mexico, especially when the conference is right in the centre of the 'Hotel Zone', is an expensive place!

I also applied for, but was unsuccessful:

The Paul Kanciruk Student Travel Award for the International Lobster Conferences and Workshops - this is specifically for the ICWL conference, but if you are looking for conference funding, always get in touch with the organisers - they sometimes have money for poor students like us!

Plus, here are some which I have come across but I was ineligible for...

The Fisheries Society of the British Isles (FSBI) Travel Grants, primarily aimed at early-career scientists studying fish biology or fisheries science. Grants are to enable researchers to present their work at international scientific meetings other than the FSBI annual conference.

With most of these awards, you need to be a member of the society itself, so it's worth checking before you apply - some even request that you have been a member for a certain amount of time before you may apply. Personally, I like to have memberships with a lot of societies as it opens doors and helps you make contacts in similar fields, as well as discounts when submitting papers to certain journals (again, a big plus if you are self-funded). On top of the blog post for the Society of Biology, I have recently been asked to give a talk at the Cheltenham Science Festival - the day I arrive home from Mexico!

So there we are, another monster post - but one I've been meaning to write for a while... How is it May already? Someone told me this week that I was on 'the home straight'... I'm not sure what that meant, but it did remind me that I have huge amount to do (and write!)... to the lab!