Pew Institute for Ocean Science awards 5 fellowships in support of global marine co...( NEW YORK CITY -- The Pew Institute f...)

NEW YORK CITY -- The Pew Institute for Ocean Science (www.pewoceanscience.org) today announced the 2008 recipients of the Pew Fellowship in Marine Conservation, the preeminent fellowship in support of ocean conservation. The five awardees will each receive $150,000 to conduct innovative three-year projects that are urgently needed to improve coral reef health, sustain fisheries, and enhance the effectiveness of marine protected areas. The winners are based in the United States, China, France, Australia and Canada and join more than 100 Pew Fellows in Marine Conservation from 29 countries around the globe. This year the program welcomes the first Fellows from China and France.

The Fellows will work to:

• equip the worlds ailing corals to better survive climate change by creating groundbreaking thermal enhancement techniques that arm corals against warming oceans (work to be based in Florida);

• safeguard Antarctic krill fish populations that serve as critical food sources for whales and are being fished at unprecedented levels (to be based in Australia);

• heal and protect southeast Chinas coastal areas by improving and expanding the regions network of Marine Protected Areas (to be based in China);

• document the financial factors contributing to unsustainable commercial fishing and depletion of ocean resources around the world (to be based in Canada); and,

• determine whether a widely heralded commercial fishing strategy which targets one or more species to minimize wasteful bycatch actually harms the ecosystem more than fishing non-selectively (to be based in France).

The 2008 Pew Fellows in Marine Conservation are solutions-oriented scientific innovators, and this award will propel their efforts to conserve the global ocean environment, said Dr. Ellen Pikitch, Executive Director of the Pew Institute for Ocean Science, a major program of the Uni
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