The Loop podcast takes a deep dive into the Gulf of Mexico with the researchers studying the processes, mechanisms, and impacts of oil spills.
Researchers from the Center for Integrated Modeling and Analysis of Gulf Ecosystems (C-IMAGE) discuss their studies with David Levin of Mind Open Media. C-IMAGE is an international research group studying mud, microbes and mammals after two mega spills, Deepwater Horizon and Ixtoc I. The goal of C-IMAGE is to advance understanding of the fundamental processes and mechanisms of marine blowouts and their consequences, ensuring that society is better-prepared to mitigate future events.
Episode 1: Overview of C-IMAGE
C-IMAGE PI Dr. Steven Murawski talks to David Levin about C-IMAGE’s research goals and the importance of integration when tackling large scale impacts. This episode is available in English and Spanish. (Transcript: English, Español)
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Episode 2: The Mud and the Blood
C-IMAGE PIs Steven Murawski and David Hollander talk to David Levin aboard the R/V Weatherbird II in August 2012 about looking for Deepwater Horizon‘s impacts on Gulf of Mexico mud and fish. This episode is available in English and Spanish. (Transcript: English, Español)
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Episode 3: The “Not-So-Visible” Impacts of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill on the Gulf of Mexico
Three years after the BP oil well disaster, scientists are struggling to understand the effects on the Gulf ecosystem. David Levin reports on the oil’s impact on the tiny creatures that form the base of the food chain. (Transcript: English)
Episode 4: Fitting the Gulf of Mexico Inside a Computer: How to Build an Ecosystem Model
David Levin talks with C-IMAGE members Cameron Ainsworth, Jason Lenes, Michelle Masi, and Brian Smith about building an ecosystem model of the Gulf of Mexico to describe how oil spills impact marine life. (Transcript: English, Español)
Episode 5: The Pressure is On!
David Levin talks with C-IMAGE PI Steven Murawski and scientists from the Technical University of Hamburg at Harburg Michael Schluter and Karen Malone about their ongoing experiments examining oil and gas droplets under high pressure to learn more about the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. (Transcript: English, Español)
Episode 6: Oil – It’s What’s for Dinner…
C-IMAGE scientists want to know more about how oil-eating microorganisms behave in the cold deep ocean to learn more about what happened to the oil from the Deepwater Horizon blowout. High-pressure experiments underway at our high pressure facility at the Hamburg University of Technology focus on how these microbes use oil and what happens to them in the process. Results from these studies may lead to a new way to clean up spills by eliminating its most poisonous ingredients. (Transcript: English, Español)
Episode 7: The Ixtoc Spill – Reflections
The Deepwater Horizon oil spill happened just a few years ago, but it might be possible to predict its impact on the Gulf by studying another major spill, one that happened in 1979. “These are two of the largest spills in the world’s history as far as blowouts go, and they were both in the Gulf of Mexico.” Wes Tunnell is a marine biologist who is looking at the aftermath of both spills. It’s almost like he’s looking at the same crime scene, separated by more than three decades. How? Give a listen. Mind Open Media producer David Levin talks to Wes Tunnell and John Farrington about their experiences during the 1979 Ixtoc spill and the applications to new blowouts thirty years late. This episode is available in English and Spanish. (Transcript: English, Español)
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Episode 8: In the Mud in Mexico
“We were of the mind that with studying the Deepwater Horizon in the northern Gulf we weren’t getting a full Gulf of Mexico perspective.” Geochemist David Hollander is traveling with an international team of scientists aboard a Mexican research vessel. Over the last few years, his team has studied the effects of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon spill. But today, they’re looking back at a spill that happened 35 years ago and what they learn on this trip might help them understand the future of the Gulf. Mind Open Media producer David Levin talks to David Hollander, Joel Ortega Ortiz, Isabel Romero, Adriana Gaytán-Caballero, and Travis Washburn about their experiences on the RV Justo Sierra in the southern Gulf of Mexico during the research on the Ixtoc spill. (Transcript: English, Español)
Episode 9: Forensic Oceanography
Listen to learn how scientists reanalyzed remotely sensed data taken in the late 1970s to study the Ixtoc 1 oil spill. Dr. Chuanmin Hu and his graduate student Shaojie Sun use the Landsat and Coastal Zone Color Scanner (CZCS) data to develop “treasure maps” of oil from the IXTOC-1 spill to steer field studies. Listen in to find out how they did it. This episode is available in English and Spanish. (Transcript: English, Español)
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Episode 10: The Risks for Fish
What happened to the fish in the days and weeks after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill? With a suite of exposure studies, C-IMAGE researchers are monitoring fish health after oil exposure in order to find out. Dr. Dana Wetzel and Kevan Main of Mote Marine Laboratory give fish a small does of oil through either their food, water, or the sea floor sediments, then analyze how their bodies recover. (Transcript: English, Español)
Episode 11: The Cuban Connection: Spills, Science Diplomacy
C-IMAGE collaborated with researchers from the University of Havana for the first join U.S.-Cuban expedition in over 50 years. (Transcript: English)
Episode 12: MTS TechSurge
When research and industry can communicate effectively when responding to an oil spill, both the environment and oil industry benefit from shared knowledge and new technologies. (Transcript: English)
Episode 13: For a Few Dollars More – Costs and Ecosystem Services after Spills
When oil spills are assessed through an economic viewpoint, both environmental and human impacts must be considered to provide a full picture. (Transcript: English)
Episode 14: Modeling Arctic Oil Spills
Understanding the long-term effects of arctic spills like this one could be even more urgent now than ever, as oil exploration makes its way to the North Slope of Alaska (including inside the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge). C-IMAGE has developed a computer model of the entire Gulf ecosystem, so they could test how future spills would affect the region. And now, they’re applying those tools farther north. (Transcript: English)
Episode 15: Asphalt Ecosystems
At the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico, some truly bizarre ecosystems are hiding in the darkness among the asphalt volcanoes and supporting huge colonies of unique life. C-IMAGE has been analyzing these ecosystems and reveals that if chemosynthetic communities are harmed, it could affect other environments as well. The microbes that power those communities don’t just eat chemicals in oil or asphalt—they also eat up a lot of free-floating carbon that would otherwise escape to the rest of the ocean… and eventually, get into the atmosphere, adding to global climate change. (Transcript: English)
Episode 16: Panel Discussion
For the past several years, The Loop covered the work of scientists studying the aftermath of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill. The research is winding down and this is The Loop‘s last podcast with C-IMAGE! (Transcript: English)