By subject Science and Technology Media invited to Morehead City stop of Tar Heel Bus Tour on May 12
| Media invited to Morehead City stop of Tar Heel Bus Tour on May 12 |
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| Friday, May 09, 2008 | |
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Media representatives are invited to join the 2008 Tar Heel Bus Tour for a stop Monday (May 12) in Morehead City. The privately funded tour, May 12-16, will take 36 new UNC-Chapel Hill faculty members across the state to learn about its people, economy, environment, culture and history. Monday (May 12) 2:30 to 4:30 p.m. Institute of Marine Sciences 3431 Arendell St., Morehead City New faculty members will take a boat ride through a nature preserve estuary to the barrier island of Shackleford Banks with Rick Luettich, IMS director; Pete Peterson, alumni professor at IMS; and Mike Piehler, assistant professor at IMS. These UNC-Chapel Hill scientists will demonstrate water-quality testing and talk about its research in the area. One focus of IMS is to monitor the effects of humans on water quality in the region. In 2001, a team of Carolina and Duke University marine scientists installed water quality monitoring equipment on local ferries to evaluate and model how changes in the Pamlico Sound’s ecosystem relate to human impact. The data collected from the FerryMon project helps determine ways to protect the sound in the future. It has been a model for water monitoring that has been followed by scientists in Florida, Massachusetts, Maine, New York, California and Washington. Luettich has been extensively involved in retrospectively modeling Hurricane Katrina’s storm surge and is now helping to design a comprehensive plan to protect southern Louisiana from further hurricane damage. At the same time, Luettich is working with the Renaissance Computing Institute (RENCI), Army Corps of Engineers and National Weather Service to develop a system to forecast storm surge on the North Carolina coast. Luettich can be reached at (252) 726-6841, ext. 137. Itinerary: For the weeklong itinerary of the Tar Heel Bus Tour, visit http://www.unc.edu/bustour/ . News Services contact: Susan Houston, (919) 962-8415, This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it |