This year’s Estuarine and Coastal Ocean Physics Conference will be held in Bourdeaux, France, where researchers are looking forward to meeting some of the leading experts in the field.
ORONO, Maine — Nine University of Maine researchers are heading to Bordeaux, France, to attend a conference on estuaries and coastal ocean physics.
The conference provides scientists with an opportunity to meet, exchange ideas and receive advice from leading experts in the field.
Approximately 200 people will attend, with many representatives from the University of Maine in attendance — in fact, the conference is co-hosted by Dr. Lauren Ross, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering.
Ross said the work she and her colleagues do is rooted in Maine.
“Our research questions, what we’re asking and what we’re studying are based in coastal communities,” she said.
Narika Lakmalli, one of five doctoral students, said she had dreamed of studying a river with a tidal range similar to the Penobscot.
“There’s a lot of tides here,” she said of being able to do her research in Maine. “I’m in the best place in the world to study the tides.”
One of Lakmalli’s advisers, Dr. Kimberly Hugenard, said she could personally attest to the value of attending the conference.
“This is something I did as a doctoral student,” she said. “It made a deep impression on me and is one of the reasons I wanted to go into academia.”
One of the presentations she will be making at the conference will be about her research into how tides, storm surges and river currents converge during storms.
“It’s not just about adding one thing and then adding the other. It can be a lot bigger than that,” she explained.
We hope that the PECS conference will spark ideas and methods for studying these phenomena.
