News & Updates

Sharing science and stories across the North Pacific: PICES 2025

In November 2025, I flew across the largest and deepest ocean on Earth and landed in Japan for a week of discovery and collaboration (and amazing food!) at the North Pacific Marine Sciences Organization (PICES) annual meeting. PICES promotes and coordinates marine research in the North Pacific. The conference brought together over 600 ocean professionals from across the North Pacific to explore Innovative Approaches and Applications to Foster Resilience in North Pacific Ecosystems.

Ocean Biomolecular Observing Network (OBON) Annual Projects Meeting 2025

The Ocean Biomolecular Observing Network (OBON) is a UN Decade program building a global biodiversity monitoring system using environmental DNA (eDNA). As co-lead of West Coast OBON, I traveled to the annual OBON Projects Meeting in Hobart to share our 2025 progress, including two workshops, a new reference sequence guide, and protocol development with BeBOP. I learned about innovative Western Pacific efforts such as PacMAN, the Australian Microbiome Initiative, and Make eDNA FAIR. I also helped lead discussions on improving global reference libraries and planning a microgrant proposal. The meeting highlighted the importance of coordinated, FAIR eDNA data to advance marine biodiversity science.