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Greetings from Stanford University.
I'm Bill Barnett, a professor at
the Stanford Graduate School
of Business and the Stanford Doerr
School of Sustainability.
>> I'm Ingrid Ackerman,
a junior studying environmental
systems engineering.
>> And we have with us here today
Professor Fiorenza Micheli from
the Stanford Doerr School of
Sustainability.
And we just had, a week ago,
a tremendous conference on
the intersection of
sustainability and marine science.
And Professor Micheli, thank you so
much for
making the time to come here.
>> Thank you Bill, and
thank you, Ingrid,
I'm really happy to be here.
>> Fantastic, Ingrid,
you were at the conference.
What are your reactions?
>> So this was
an incredible two-day event.
The first day of the conference was
more focused on kind of
the problems in the ocean space.
What can we measure,
what can we quantify?
What do the cutting-edge scientists
know right now?
The second day of the conference,
we kind of took what we just
learned and thought about how
does this relate to business and
sustainability?
And what are some possible
solutions or
things that the business realm can
do to help marine science?
>> Well, that's interesting.
So now we've got Professor Micheli
here, what questions would you
have for her?
>> Sure, so from the conference,
what do you
think those big learnings we have
are right now in marine science?
>> So first of all,
let me take a step back and
say that the challenge that we're
facing in marine science,
is that whole oceans are huge.
They're vast, they're deep,
they're a really difficult
environment to study.
As a result, we know very little
about the oceans.
However, that has rapidly
changed over the past two decades.
In fact, now we have lots and lots
of data streams that are coming in
because of technological advances.
It's been called a data tsunami.
We've collected more data in the
past 20 years than in the previous
centuries in the ocean environment.
So why is this important?
The oceans are 70% of our planet,
90% of its habitable space.
So they are a very big part of
life, our planet support system.
However, they're under tremendous
pressure from climate change and
overexploitation of resources,
pollution, and
many other pressures.
And so in oceans, we're facing, and
as marine scientists and
marine practitioners,
we're facing the urgency of
addressing these problems.
Also through ocean discovery by
understanding more about
the oceans, and at the same time,
to form the partnerships that
will enable us to provide solutions
at scale.
And so this motivated
the conference, really.
And now I think that as you
described, the first part was okay,
where are we at?
What are we learning, how?
What do we need to do to learn more
and ramp up the pace and
scale of learning?
And then the second day was
devoted to how do we make progress
in terms of addressing these
pressing challenges?
And I would say that one of
the main takeaways from all this
was that the solutions will come
from bringing together different
disciplines, different skill sets,
different communities.
Now that it's really about
partnerships, fully engaging
the diversity of talent, of needs,
of visions that are out there.
And I think this really came across
in the second day with the
participation of speakers from the
humanities, from computer science,
advances in machine learning.
So now, really,
one of the most exciting parts is
that data are important, and
exploration is absolutely
fundamental and important.
But then the tools that will enable
us to transform those data and
understanding, and that that
understanding into actions and
solutions is where the new frontier
is in ocean science.
>> That's very interesting, Fio.
We always hear about the need for
more interdisciplinary work, and
you go right to that with your
answer.
Could you give us a specific
finding, or takeaway, or example
that makes that tangible for us?
>> Yes, a couple of examples
included the advances in
transforming images, the millions
of images that are collected by
underwater cameras and remotely
operated vehicle and submersible.
All the way from Citizen Science of
people getting into water and
taking picture from the more
sophisticated underwater vehicles.
And then with the advances that
combine with advances in artificial
intelligence and computer vision,
rapidly assessing the biodiversity
in oceans, leveraging these images.
So going from a process that would
take armies of people working on it
and years to an automation
of diversity.
And then another really exciting
example is that sometimes this
flood of data and real important
information comes through means
that were not designed for
open ocean exploration.
For example, large vessels have to
carry transponders to signal their
position.
This is for
safety as an anti-collision device.
And so every few minutes,
we have the positions of about 70%
of vessels around the world.
And so now, this data are available
and have been used, combined with
advances in machine learning,
to quantify and track fishing
activity and deep sea mining and
lots of other uses of the ocean.
And so now we have this picture,
now the oceans where,
let's say this vast unknown.
Now we have this real time picture
of how much of the ocean is used,
not all, of course,
because this is for large vessel.
So these are examples of kind of
the breakthrough that the speakers
and the panelists and
the participant in the conferences
discussed.
>> That's fantastic.
>> So in both of those examples,
it sounds like there were some
partnerships between both
academia and
then possibly private institutions.
We touched on
that at the conference.
Do you mind expanding?
>> Yes, so these are all examples
of partnership between civil
society, industry, governments,
academic institution, all of these
examples entail this partnership.
What I thought was really exciting
is that there was much discussion
of how to bring the costs and
the access down.
And for example,
one of the participants talked
about FieldKit,
these cheap sensors, low-cost
sensors that they have produced.
That this company has produced to
allow environmental monitoring in
the ocean, as well as on land,
as well as the software platforms
that enable access to all.
And then another example was
Manu Prakash.
So this was Shah Selbe from
Conservify.
Another example was Manu Prakash
here from Bioengineering at
Stanford, who talked about frugal
science, how to bring the capacity
of microscope or plankton trackers
of environmental DNA at scale by
working with citizens and
communities around the world.
To make this capacity not only
greater, but also more accessible
and responsive to the need of
communities, not necessarily
scientists in an academic
institution here in North America,
but the people on the ground that
need that understanding,
that need that knowledge.
So I thought those were all really
exciting examples.
And then along these lines, there
was one of the lightning talks.
We had these short talks that
presented kind of advertisement of
research advances.
And there were a few that focused
on do-it-yourself science,
on students and
communities including indigenous
communities that come up with their
own tools and approaches.
To monitor things like seafood
contamination and
health of the seafood consumed all
the way to the soundscapes of coral
leaf, the noises that fish and
crustacean make that allow us to
track changes in diversity, for
example.
So it was really exciting.
And a portfolio of ways of thinking
about scaling this capacity, but
also making it more responsive
to needs.
>> That's incredible, and so
there were indigenous communities
contributing new knowledge?
>> Yes.
>> Where were they from?
>> So the cases that were covered
were from Alaska.
And there's other examples across
the Pacific and
other locations where there's
traditional knowledge, and also
the integration with new knowledge
acquired through these tools.
For example, one of the project
that was discussed is
a collaboration between Stanford
University and the Northern Chumash
tribe in San Luis Obispo.
Which has proposed a new
National Marine Sanctuary is called
the Chumash Heritage National
Marine Sanctuary to protect an area
of the coast here in
central California.
And they're partnering
with academic scientist
to use environmental DNA,
the fragments of genetic materials
that are shed by organisms in
the marine environments,
not from their skin and their
secretions to track the diversity
in their proposed sanctuary.
So it's an integration
of traditional knowledge.
What is known traditionally about
those areas being corridors for
movements of species, for example,
with these new tools from genomics
and genetics that scale up and
ramp up the speed at which we can
understand marine biodiversity.
>> That's incredible.
>> So do you think it's fair to say
that over the past few decades,
we've rapidly increased how much
we're able to learn about
the marine environment?
But now we're at the point where
we're scaling it
to make it accessible to complete
the data sets and
to integrate this knowledge with
the rest of the world?
Is that a fair assessment of
where we are?
>> Yes, and so yes, I think that
we're seeing a true expansion,
an explosion of our ability to
explore the ocean.
But I think that it's important to
note that perhaps the most
important message is, what is this
knowledge for, and for whom?
And I think that this came out from
the conference, that you can always
collect more data,
you can always invest
more resources in exploration, and
that is very important, of course.
But the breakthrough, the urgency
is associated on how that
information is then accessible and
supporting decisions that people
need to make all over the world.
Including a greater diversity of
marine scientists and practitioners
in a broader definition,
not only academia and
supporting decision-making and
solution to the grand challenges
that we're facing in oceans, but
really in the planet.
Now, one of the messages is not
only there's an urgency to address
the issues affecting oceans and
ocean health and
sustainable uses of oceans,
but oceans hold solutions to other
challenges in climate mitigation,
in food, in water, in human health.
And so through oceans,
we can also address challenges that
affect us all, our planet.
>> That's an incredible message.
I think most of our listeners
would've heard at different times
about climate, its effects, ocean
acidification, and these kinds of
things that are talked about,
biodiversity, obviously.
You mentioned human health,
talk more about that link.
>> Yes, so
the link between ocean health and
human health takes different form.
And some are related to nutrition
and food.
In a recent effort co-led by
Stanford Center for
Ocean Solution and the Center for
Food Security and Environment here
at Stanford Doerr School, it's
called the Blue Food Assessment.
Studies have shown that aquatic
foods, the animals and
plants that are grown or harvested
from aquatic environments,
including the oceans are often very
high in nutrient contents,
items like vitamin B12, and
omega-3 fatty acids and calcium.
First of all,
there's a very large diversity of
different kinds of aquatic foods.
And many of them are incredibly
nutritious and
accessible to populations
that suffer from malnutrition, for
example, micronutrients deficiency.
So one of the link to health is to
nutrition and for
the potential to harness aquatic
foods to address malnutrition and
micronutrient deficiency.
However, there's also other links,
for example, mental health.
There's now increasing evidence
linking access and proximity and
a relationship with the ocean with
mental health.
And there are several
organizations, for example,
that are using surfing,
aquatic activities as a way of
reconnecting people with nature,
of promoting physical activity and
mental health, particularly in
underserved communities.
So those are now some of the links.
And then finally, there's
a movement to create blue spaces in
addition to green spaces, for
example, in coastal cities where
people can have easy access and
enjoy the ocean environment for
physical and mental benefits.
>> Wow, that's amazing.
>> And do you think that we're
making progress in terms of taking
what we've learned and implementing
it and turning these into policy
initiatives and into actions?
Do you think we're
kind of on the edge to make more
improvements there?
>> Well, the amazing unprecedented
window of opportunity is now,
because this is the decade,
the UN decade for ocean science for
sustainability.
And the Sustainable Development
Goals and all these global
commitment to achieve the planet
and humanity that we all want
includes now one goal, number 14,
which is for a healthy ocean.
So this is the window of
opportunity to ramp up the policy
and the action to deliver
the potentials the oceans can
provide for planetary stewardship
and human well-being.
>> Well, Professor Fiorenza
Micheli, thank you so much for
coming to us.
Ingrid, thanks a lot.
And thanks to all of you from
Stanford University.
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>> The Stanford Initiative on
Business and Environmental
Sustainability podcast series is
sponsored by the Stanford Graduate
School of Business and the Stanford
Doerr School of Sustainability.
Music by Charged Particles,
that's Caleb Hustlar,
Mike Rak, and Jon Krosnick.
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