The Marine Institute has announced that it will lead a major €14.5m Europe-wide project called Aquatic Research Infrastructure Services for the health and protection of our unique oceans, seas, and freshwater ecosystems (AQUARIUS). This 48-month project aims to provide free access to state-of-the-art research facilities across Europe to enable collaborative marine and freshwater research.

AQUARIUS will provide a comprehensive suite of integrated research infrastructures to address significant challenges for the long-term sustainability of oceans, seas, and freshwater ecosystems. This project will bring together a diverse range of 57 research infrastructure services such as research vessels, mobile marine observation platforms, aircraft, drones, satellite, sensors, fixed freshwater and marine observatories and test sites, experimental facilities, and sophisticated data service infrastructures.

For the first time, diverse research infrastructures will be combined in a single project to facilitate the work of researchers and key stakeholders focused on challenges and opportunities for both marine and freshwater systems. All data collected within the project will be fed into central European data infrastructures to inform future policy and decision making at a European and national level.

The project will include training for third-level students, and it will support the development phase of the EU Mission to Restore our Ocean and waters by 2030, the Sustainable Blue Economy Partnership, the European Green Deal, and international climate initiatives. It will also be an essential component in achieving the European Digital Twin of the Ocean and the UN Decade for Ocean Sciences.

The AQUARIUS project, funded under the HORIZON Europe Research & Innovation Action call for access to research infrastructures, will provide funded access to Marine Institute infrastructures free of charge to European and international researchers. It will also provide the opportunity for national researchers to access other European state-of-the-art technologically advanced infrastructure facilities, thus broadening the knowledge and skill set across disciplines.

According to Dr. Rick Officer, CEO of the Marine Institute, leading this pan-European program puts the Marine Institute and Ireland in a leadership role in the research infrastructure sector in Europe. Such collaborative research initiatives are vital to enable researchers to gather data, which can inform policy and decision-making and contribute to international marine management, conservation, and policy.

The AQUARIUS project provides the ideal platform from which the Marine Institute can invest in and optimize its infrastructure, including vessels, laboratories, and other facilities and equipment, to improve the way it does its work and provide the national and international research community with access to state-of-the-art, technologically advanced infrastructure.

Aodhán Fitzgerald, Research Vessel Operations Manager at the Marine Institute and AQUARIUS Project Coordinator, said that the project would enable access to an unprecedented number and combination of research infrastructures. With a fleet of 18 state-of-the-art research vessels, aircraft and drones, as well as mobile and fixed operational platforms, this is an extremely exciting project for European and international marine and freshwater researchers as they now have opportunities to work together to access integrated infrastructures in the Baltic and the North Sea Basins, Black Sea, Atlantic/Arctic, and Mediterranean Sea along with their associated rivers.

The needs of researchers will be met through a robust and transparent system of transnational access funding calls, facilitated by a centralized user-friendly access portal. The Call program will be informed through stakeholder engagement and brokerage events aligning with the EU Mission Restore our Ocean and Waters by 2030 Lighthouse Regions. AQUARIUS invites collaboration and engagement from researchers, industrial communities, citizen science groups, and SMEs through a highly focused outreach programme.

The Marine Institute welcomed Mari Skåre, the Norwegian Ambassador to Ireland, on an official visit to the Marine Institute’s headquarters in Galway on Tuesday (5 March).

Commenting on the visit, Dr Rick Officer, chief executive of the Marine Institute said: “We are delighted to welcome H.E. Ambassador Skåre to the Marine Institute. Ireland and Norway have long shared a commitment to marine research and development. Today’s visit provides an opportunity to reflect on the progress we’ve made on collaborative projects under Horizon Europe, and an opportunity to look to the future and new areas for further cooperation.”

International cooperation is essential to developing knowledge of the Atlantic Ocean, its dynamic systems and its interlinkages with the Arctic region. Such collaboration is both necessary and urgent as society adapts to climate and environmental changes taking place around the world, the institute says.

Ireland already collaborates with Norway on over 50 marine and maritime projects through Horizon Europe and collaborative networks such as the Joint Programming Initiative for Healthy and Productive Seas and Oceans (JPI Oceans) and the Sustainable Blue Economy Partnership.

These research projects range thematically from biodiversity to marine ecosystem services, marine pollution, circular economy, blue carbon, coastal resilience, citizen engagement projects, maritime navigation and important cooperation on marine research infrastructure projects.

Ambassador Skåre and Dr Officer also discussed the implementation of the United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021-2030), a global initiative to stimulate ocean science and knowledge generation that can reverse declines in the state of the ocean system while catalysing new opportunities for sustainable ocean use.

Dr Officer added: “From our shared Atlantic coastlines, to our rich maritime histories, Ireland and Norway share a profound commitment to advancing marine research and sustainable development. A more resilient and prosperous maritime future will be to the betterment of both nations and the global marine ecosystem, as a whole.

“From exploring sustainable fisheries to studying oceanography and climate change impacts, both of our nations remain dedicated to understanding and protecting our oceans for future generations.”

A major new European project aims to improve our understanding of how the bycatch of fisheries impacts protected, endangered and threatened species (PETS) in the Atlantic Ocean, and develop methods for better monitoring and mitigating these impacts.

Funded by the European Union’s Horizon Europe programme, Marine Beacon (Monitoring and elimination of bycatch of endangered and conserved species in the NE and high seas Atlantic region) will address gaps in current understanding of how bycatch impacts PETS.

It will also work with fisheries, policy and conservation stakeholders to develop and test innovative tools and techniques for better monitoring of important species and mitigating risks of bycatch, to ensure healthier seas and more sustainable fisheries.

Bycatch — the unintentional capture of non-target marine wildlife during fishing — is recognised as a major threat to marine species globally, particularly marine mammals, seabirds, turtles and sensitive fish species, as well as the ecosystems that rely on these creatures.

Yet monitoring of these species and their interactions with fishing in such a dynamic and challenging environment has often been ineffective.

Advancements in bycatch mitigation and elimination have lagged behind the urgency of the issue, with many proposed solutions failing to adequately take into account the differing realities of diverse fisheries and lacking sufficient input from relevant industry and policy stakeholders.

In order to address the issue of biodiversity decline in our Atlantic regions and help the recovery of these ecosystems and their services, Marine Beacon brings together 21 research, technology, and fisheries partners from nine countries.

Together they will work across our regional seas to identify significant gaps in our monitoring and understanding of bycatch, and to introduce innovative knowledge and tools to better understand bycatch risk and vulnerability.

By inclusively collaborating with key stakeholders in the fisheries, policy and conservation sectors, Marine Beacon aims to ensure that new, cutting-edge monitoring and mitigation tools are effective and feasible, providing long-term applicability and impact beyond the lifetime of the project.

The project has six key objectives:

• Engage with key stakeholder groups to build mutual understanding on how to effectively mitigate against the bycatch of PETS.
• Improve our knowledge of how PETS intersect with bycatch and identify how improved survey and monitoring design can fill gaps in data.
• Evaluate the specific risk posed by fisheries bycatch to the vulnerability status of PETS.
• Advance next generation monitoring solutions, design optimal monitoring programmes and accelerate EU monitoring programmes to better achieve EU biodiversity strategy 2030 targets for eliminating or reducing PETS bycatch.
• Develop state of the art mitigation solutions that reduce bycatch and where possible eliminate associated mortalities.
• Create integrated bycatch management decision support tools to help Member States’ respective management programmes achieve their objectives.

Marine Beacon was launched on Wednesday 21 February and will run for four-and-a-half years. It is coordinated by Ireland’s Marine Institute and comprises an expert team from Belgium, Denmark, France, Greenland, Iceland, Ireland, Portugal, Spain and the UK. For more information, follow on LinkedIn and X (formerly Twitter) at @MarineBEACON_EU.

The Marine Institute will be exhibiting at two stands at the Irish Skipper Expo this Friday 23 and Saturday 24 February at the University of Limerick.

Firstly, the institute’s shellfish team will present the work it carries out on data collection, assessment and advice on shellfish species.

The newly published Shellfish Stocks and Fisheries Review for 2023 will be available both in hard copy and online, with data reported for all major shellfish species that the inshore fishing fleet rely on.

Its online equivalent, the Shellfish Fisheries App, will be launched providing online access to shellfish surveys and assessments undertaken by the shellfish team.

The industry provides much of the data going into the shellfish assessments and the stand provides an opportunity for both parties to discuss inputs and outputs from this important programme for the inshore fishing fleet in Ireland.

In addition to all issues relating to commercially fished shellfish around the Irish coast, the Marine Institute will be on hand to talk about the current inshore Vessel Monitoring System (iVMS), the ICeco (Irish Coastal Ecosystem) survey and the skipper self-sampling programme, currently out for tender, which is an opportunity for skippers to get involved and be paid for reporting of data on crab and lobster fisheries to the Marine Institute.

The EMFAF (European Maritime Fisheries and Aquaculture Fund) Marine Biodiversity and Marine Knowledge Schemes team will also attend the Irish Skipper Expo to showcase to industry and stakeholders the priorities being implemented under these schemes.

These include contributing to the protection and restoration of aquatic biodiversity and strengthening sustainable sea and ocean management. Marine Institute staff will be available to provide information on the implementation of the EMFAF operational programmes and the projects funded and implemented by the institute.

‘The biodiversity scheme under Ireland’s EMFAF programme helps provide the science and evidence basis to support a sustainable seafood production programme’

“In order for seafood production to be sustainable it is important that not only is the resource carefully managed, but the impacts of harvesting that resource on the wider ecosystem are also considered,” director of fisheries Ciaran Kelly said.

“The biodiversity scheme under Ireland’s EMFAF programme helps provide the science and evidence basis to support a sustainable seafood production programme that also protects and restores marine biodiversity.”

The Marine Knowledge Scheme, meanwhile, aims to enable the collection, management, analysis, processing and use of marine data to improve the knowledge on the state of the marine environment and inform a sustainable blue economy.

An important goal is to contribute to the achievement of climate change objectives. The scheme will improve understanding of impacts of climate change on marine activities and on the environment.

EMFAF has many projects under way at the moment under both schemes, including the assessment of the crayfish fishery to restore the crayfish stocks and protect critically endangered species.

In addition, the data and digital services programme enables the collection and analysis of marine data covering the full breadth of marine activities and ensuring delivery on national obligations relating to marine spatial planning, marine environment, fisheries data, marine renewable energy and climate.

Climate projects being implemented are contributing to climate change mitigation and adaptation in fisheries and aquaculture. This will help to deliver on Ireland’s Climate Action Plan 2023. The focus of these includes the highly skilled areas of remote sensing and climate change projections. It means that Government and other stakeholders have a solid evidence base available to formulate decisions.

The EMFAF Marine Biodiversity and Marine Knowledge Schemes are cofunded by the Irish Government and the European Maritime Fisheries & Aquaculture Fund (EMFAF) 2021-2027. The schemes are established under Priority 1 (Sustainable Fisheries) and Priority 2 (Sustainable Aquaculture) and Priority 4 (Strengthen Ocean Governance) of Ireland’s Operational Programme (OP) under the EMFAF.

The Marine Institute Explorers Education Programme team has launched a new set of resources for primary schools, aimed at promoting Ireland’s rich marine biodiversity in the classroom. The new class projects, called Fin-tastic Sharks+, will focus on the 71 species of sharks, skates, and rays that can be found in Irish waters. 

Cushla Dromgool Regan, Explorers Education Manager and lead author of the resources, said that the team was "delighted to be celebrating the launch of the Explorers Fin-Tastic Sharks+ new online shark resources over Valentines." 

The resources, which are available for free download from explorers.ie, include a range of cross-curricular activities that teachers and children can use to explore different shark themes in class or on the seashore. The content covers everything from STEM activities to design and communication projects, and is suitable for children of all ages. 

Patricia Orme, Corporate Services Director at the Marine Institute, congratulated the Explorers team on creating new materials to promote Ireland's marine biodiversity in primary schools. "Primary school teachers and children around the coast love learning about sharks and their relatives," she said. "It is always a favourite topic to cover with children, teachers and our outreach teams, who visit the classes of over 13,000 children annually."

The resources include a new Explorers mermaid’s purse key that is suitable for children to use in the classroom and on the shore. The key covers the top ten shark and skate cases typically found on the shores around Ireland, and provides lots of extra shark and skate information to encourage children to become citizen scientists, recording their egg case finds online.

The launch of the new resources comes at a time when the Marine Institute's fisheries scientific team has recorded two baby white skates during the annual groundfish survey while on the RV Celtic Explorer. This was an extremely rare find, as the white skate is listed as Critically Endangered. Of the 58 cartilaginous shark, skate and ray species researched in Irish waters, over 60 percent of them are listed as a Near Threatened, Vulnerable, Endangered or Critically Endangered.

Ms Dromgool-Regan explained that sharing positive stories about sharks, skates and rays can help people understand the importance of having these species in Irish waters. "This helps us all get involved in better managing and protecting our marine resource now and for the future," she said.

The Marine Institute has shared its pride in celebrating the International Day of Women and Girls in Science on Sunday 11 February.

The United Nations Theme for the ninth International Day of Women and Girls in Science is “Women in Science Leadership: A New Era for Sustainability”.

The Marine Institute provides scientific, research and development services to government, agencies, industry and society that support the sustainable use of our maritime area and the protection and restoration of marine ecosystems.

Sustainability is at the heart of how the institute works as an organisation and is a guiding principle for its research, scientific advice and economic development services, it says.

None of this could be achieved without the contribution of the many women who work in the institute, it adds, saying it has a longstanding commitment to equality in the workforce and to encouraging young people to consider a career in our sector.

Initiatives include education and engagement at national school level, its annual Transition Year programme and work as partners with many third-level institutions in Ireland and overseas.

The Marine Institute has a staff of 245 employees, of which female employees account for more than half (51.2%).

Patricia Orme, director of corporate Services at the Marine Institute said: “As an organisation we are committed to fostering the talents of women in all areas of marine science, particularly those at the early stages of their careers, as they are the future leaders of our sector.”

She continued: “Our current five-year strategy, Ocean Knowledge that Informs and Inspires, demonstrates our commitment to women in science leadership with a strategic initiative being to advance equality of opportunity for all, with specific actions as a public body focusing on gender equality.”

To mark the occasion, the institute is also sharing messages from some of its female staff, showcasing their work, its impact and the many meaningful careers available to women in science on its Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter (X) and Instagram feeds.

The Marine Institute has announced its 2024 Summer Bursary Scholarship Programme, inviting third-level students to apply for work experience in a variety of marine areas. The programme, which has been running for over 30 years, provides essential career development, support, and inspiration to the next generation of marine professionals.

Designed to equip students with the skills to become ocean leaders and marine champions of the future, the Bursary Scholarship Programme is a key initiative of the Marine Institute's Strategic Plan 2023-2027: Ocean knowledge that informs and Inspires. Undergraduates of Universities and Institutes for Higher Education, both National and International, are eligible to apply for the programme, provided they have completed two years of study in a relevant discipline by the beginning of June 2024.

Successful candidates will work with full-time staff of the Marine Institute in a variety of exciting areas such as marine and freshwater fisheries monitoring, aquaculture, benthic monitoring, shellfish safety media and communications, SmartBay community engagements and Smart Bay AI, economics, policy analysis, human resources, oceanography machine learning, remote sensing, marine infrastructure, and marine communications.

Patricia Orme, Director of Corporate Services at the Marine Institute, said, "The Marine Institute Bursary Scholarship Programme has operated for over 30 years. It continues to offer opportunities for undergraduate students to develop their skills and strengthen their knowledge in relation to the marine sector. Participating students are enabled to make informed decisions early in their studies about the marine and maritime careers they would like to pursue."

The programme provides undergraduates with a unique opportunity to meet fellow students from other third-level colleges, as well as work with experts in their field, helping them form a future network in the marine sector. The bursaries are based at the Marine Institute's facilities in Oranmore, Co. Galway and Newport Co. Mayo.

The Marine Institute is committed to supporting a culture of high performance driven by its people, whose skills, experience, and passion for the marine are central to the work performed for government and other stakeholders. The Bursary Scholarship Programme, therefore, serves as an important investment in the future generation of ocean professionals.

To Apply for the 2024 Bursary Programme:

• Please view the bursary titles available on www.marine.ie
• Select the two bursary positions that interest you the most and in order of preference
• Complete the online application form and submit as per the instructions
• Application Deadline Date is Friday 23rd February 2024

Online application form

The Sea-Fisheries Protection Authority (SFPA), Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI) and Marine Institute will host a workshop for industry this week on the requirements relating to sanitary surveys for shellfish harvesting areas and Ireland’s implementation of the relevant legislation.

The workshop will be held in person at FSAI’s head office in Dublin as well as online from 10am to 2pm this Thursday 8 February, and will include speakers from the SFPA, FSAI, Marine Institute, IFA-Aquaculture, CEFAS (UK) and AquaFact.

Keynote speaker will be Michelle Price-Howard from the Centre for Environment, Fisheries, Aquaculture and Science (CEFAS). Price-Howard works with CEFAS as principal scientist for seafood safety and is an environmental microbiologist with 20 years of experience in environmental assessment, water quality and food safety microbiology.

Price-Howard’s work has included environmental risk assessments for sanitary surveys of both aquaculture and wild-harvest shellfisheries for Food Standards Scotland. She has also been involved in providing training at EU and national level on the planning and conducting of sanitary surveys.

In addition, the SFPA will provide presentations on data management and shellfish classification as well as an update on the sanitary survey programme in Ireland.

There will also be an extended session to allow for a discussion on any topic relevant to sanitary surveys that participants may wish to raise. To help better plan the event, participants are asked to send questions or topics in advance if possible to Una Walton at [email protected].

In-person registration is now closed but the workshop can be accessed remotely via Microsoft Teams (Meeting ID: 340 075 071 736; Passcode: g33dRq) or by calling in (audio only) to +353 1 592 3998 with phone conference ID 397 409 122#.

Extreme marine events such as marine heat waves are increasingly threatening to degrade ocean ecosystems and seafood security with potential devastating consequences to aquatic related businesses.

In order to prepare for such events, the Marine Institute, with colleagues in the Horizon 2020 Innovation Action EuroSea project, has developed a new marine observatory specifically designed to address the needs of the aquaculture sector.

The observatory web platform provides an early warning system that can be accessed at eurosea.marine.ie with a help-desk service for end users to provide suggestions or comments on their user experience.

Frequent end-user interaction was essential from the beginning of the project to ensure the service was in agreement with the needs of the industry.

This observatory integrates data from multiple ocean observing platforms (in-situ databuoys; satellites; numerical models) and provides easy access to information about the oceanographic processes affecting the fish farm facilities and its neighbouring waters.

During the EuroSea project, two oceanographic moorings with sensors developed by Xylem were deployed at the pilot sites at Deenish Island in Co Kerry and El Campello on the Costa Blanca in south-eastern Spain.

For the Irish site, satellite observations of ocean colour and sea surface temperature are provided together with information on the occurrence of marine heat waves.

The web portal also provides access to sea surface temperature historical data, starting from 1982, for any site within the Irish Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) selected by the user in an interactive application.

Modelled forecasts (eg water temperature, significant wave heights) are linked to the warning system for the EuroSea demonstration sites with a facility for end users to receive notifications on their phone. The thresholds that trigger these warnings were agreed with the end-users when the system was developed.

Finally, best practice guidelines were developed for other partners around the world who plan to develop similar marine observatories. As such, the software is open-access and a scientific paper was recently published in Frontiers in Marine Science.

The Marine Institute has released a new high-resolution geomorphology map on Ireland’s Marine Atlas for most of the Irish continental shelf to support ocean science, environment and biodiversity management and offshore renewable energy development.

Geomorphology is the scientific study of landforms and the processes that shape them.

The project, funded via the Marine Institute research grant scheme, has been developed in collaboration with the Marine Geoscience Research Group in UCC and the Geological Survey Ireland.

Through the Department of Environment, Climate and Communications funded Irish National Seabed Survey (INSS 2003-2006) and INFOMAR programmes (2006-2026), over 90% of the seafloor within Ireland’s designated and extended continental shelf area, which is in excess of 714,000 km², has been surveyed in high resolution by Geological Survey Ireland and Marine Institute.

This extensive dataset has enabled numerous research groups to delve into the transformative forces that have shaped our ocean seabed over time, including glaciations, sea level changes, currents and tides.

The combination of high-quality data, the application of advanced semi-automated mapping techniques and the recent development of international classification standards has offered the opportunity to create the most detailed and comprehensive geomorphological map of the Irish continental shelf to date.

Classification of all seabed features has undergone rigorous validation, drawing from an extensive body of scientific literature spanning the past three decades. By applying a consistent approach nationally, the map provides a unique resource to inform on a range of pressing issues within the marine environment.

Seabed mapping plays a pivotal role in addressing future challenges for the development and protection of the Irish offshore region.

While bathymetry data (eg water depth) alone provide a fundamental metric for many applications, geoscientists can add significant value by providing further data, analysis, and knowledge to better characterise the seabed.

The Marine Institute says this new geomorphology map is a prime example of how to transform scientific data into an important digital reference for policymakers, marine industries (eg offshore renewables, fisheries and aquaculture) and future marine scientists.

Marine spatial planning and resource management decisions will continue to be informed by the increasing range of digital products produced by the Marine Institute and partners.

Examples of practical application of geomorphology include decision support for the optimal placement of new offshore infrastructure; decommissioning of existing structures with considerations for their potential impacts on marine ecosystems; identification of constraints related to potential offshore carbon capture and storage (CCS); designation of future marine protected areas; and the development of more accurate models for coastal change and resilience.

The primary results of this initiative comprise 10 GIS layers that not only show the extent and location of thousands of seabed features but also detail the geological characteristics and environmental conditions responsible for their formation.

These data are now freely accessible and integrated into Ireland’s Marine Atlas under the Geology theme.

Ireland’s Marine Atlas, developed and maintained by the Marine Institute with funding from the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, serves as a comprehensive resource for viewing and downloading marine environmental data relevant to Ireland's reporting obligations under the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD).

A full description of the geomorphology mapping methodologies, the classification scheme and the outputs are available. A scientific peer reviewed article describing the mapping process and outcome has also been published in the Journal of Maps.