local audience of 55 registrants, consisting of museum profes- 

 sionals, university scholars, srudents, artists, collectors, and 

 dealers. A one-day workshop, hosted by the Museo del Arte in 

 Ponce, was intended specifically for artists who still continue 

 the tradition of santos making. Consisting of lecture and dis- 

 cussion sessions, it attracted an audience of 120 persons, about 

 65 percent of whom were actual practicing santeros and sanieras. 



In the collaborative program with the Suitland High 

 School, a local magnet school for the arts, SCMRE staff con- 

 tinued to develop and test materials for eventual inclusion in 

 a high school curriculum for an interdisciplinary arts and 

 science course. 



In the technical information program, SCMRE continued 

 to provide technical advice and expertise on preservation-re- 

 lated subjects in answer to questions received from museum 

 professionals as well as the general public. An important 

 mechanism for educating the general public in preservation is- 

 sues is provided with the "Guidelines" which, intended for 

 distribution to a wide audience, provide background informa- 

 tion and tips on the care and maintenance of a variety of col- 

 lectibles. In this respect, SCMRE's regularly updated Internet 

 Web page also continues to serve an essential role. 



Smithsonian Environmental 

 Research Center 



Ross B. Simons, Director 



SERC research continues to focus on four major themes: 

 effects of global change, landscape ecology, coastal ecosystems, 

 and population and community ecology. During 1998, SERC 

 scientists published high-quality papers on topics ranging 

 from species descriptions to global change. A major article by 

 SERCs Dr. Patrick Neale appeared in the prestigious inter- 

 national journal Nature. SERCs principal investigators were 

 awarded more new external research grants and contracts than 

 any other biological unit of the Smithsonian, all of which are 

 several times larger than SERC. 



More than ever, SERC scientists are reaching out to present 

 their work in national and international scientific meetings. 

 SERC played a key role in organizing the annual meeting of 

 the Ecological Society of America and American Institute of 

 Biological Sciences in Baltimore in August. At that meeting, 

 four SERC scientists presented papers at a special session 

 devoted to SERCs unique work on the Chesapeake Bay. In 

 addition, SERC hosted a major national meeting on invasive 

 species for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and a national 

 meeting on global change for the U.S. UV Monitoring Work 

 Group. 



SERC scientists and educators extended significant new 

 outreach to a variety of public audiences during the past year. 

 In June, SERC scientists began a new program of adult educa- 



tion consisting of a series of evening lectures on popular en- 

 vironmental topics to adults in the neighboring communities. 

 In addition, SERCs professional training program grew to 

 support more than twice the number of work/learn interns of 

 recent years. 



A major loss to SERC this past year was the death of 

 longtime principal investigator, Dt. James Lynch. Dr. Lynch 

 pioneered research in several areas that are now hot topics in 

 the technical literature and which are often featured in the 

 news media as environmental concerns. His research inves- 

 tigated the effects of habitat fragmentation on animals, the 

 indirect effects of trophic interactions, the landscape require- 

 ments of migratory animals, the evolution and population 

 ecology of amphibians, and the conservation biology of birds 

 and of tropical habitats. Importantly, Lynch led SERCs efforts 

 in international research and global environmental problems. 



The addition of Drs. Ilka Feller and Catherine Lovelock to 

 SERCs team of principal investigators has greatly enhanced 

 SERCs breadth of research. They contribute to the under- 

 standing of planr ecology and plant-animal interactions with 

 wide-ranging projects in polar, temperate, and tropical en- 

 vironmenrs. Feller also serves as rhe Smithsonian's scientific 

 coordinator for the Mpala Research Centre in Kenya. 



SERCs program in invasions biology continues to develop 

 at a remarkable rate. This program now supports more rhan 

 20 technicians and advanced students. The problem of in- 

 vasive species is increasingly recognized as a global issue 

 worthy of major funding from many governments. SERCs 

 invasion biology program leads national and international 

 research on biological invasions of coastal ecosystems. The 

 program, headed by Drs. Gregory Ruiz and Anson Hines, is 

 the largesr group in the United States to study patterns and 

 impacts of marine and estuarine invasions while seeking 

 strategies to limit them. 



Ballast water of commercial ships is currently the greatest 

 source of coastal species introductions, releasing larval stages 

 and other planktonic organisms from distant ports that are 

 able to colonize new bays and estuaries. SERC technicians are 

 sampling ballast water in tankers arriving to Port Valdez, 

 Alaska, to measure temporal (seasonal, annual) and spatial 

 (source port) variation in associated plankton communities. 

 This study, the most comprehensive of its kind worldwide, 

 shows that a rich diversity and high abundance of coastal 

 plankton is being transported and released by the tankers. 

 SERC has also been conducting experiments aboard oil 

 tankers on voyages from California to Alaska to test the effec- 

 tiveness of ballast water management in reducing unwanred 

 transfer of organisms. 



SERCs research in the Chesapeake Bay now provides the 

 most comprehensive assessment of coastal invasions for any 

 region of the nation. The study includes an intensive analysis 

 of the 400-year history of species introductions, the ecological 

 impacts of alien species and the delivery pattetns and charac- 

 teristics of ballast water. Chesapeake Bay, rhrough the ports of 

 Baltimore and Norfolk, receives more ballast water of foreign 



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