Director's Weekly Reports

Today, November 11, is a palindrome in some formats. Moreover, it's the
last 'binary' date of the century (111111). The next binary date is
January 1, 2101 (010101). See you then.

Today is also Veterans Day. Many members of the Lamont community have served in the armed forces, or have family members who have served or are currently in uniform. This is a day to pay tribute to their contributions, their service and their sacrifices...

The Consortium for Ocean Leadership, to which we belong, held its semi-annual meeting in DC this week. Dave Goldberg and I also attended a meeting of the Scientific Ocean Drilling Subcommittee of the Ocean Leadership Board. These were useful and informative meetings, highlighted by a series of presentations by Ocean Leadership and NSF senior management on the state of the federal science budgets and the impacts on ocean science research and facilities. A few tidbits: we are more confident about the support for ocean drilling within NSF, though the National Science Board still has to weigh in; NSF's Major Research Equipment and Facility Construction (MREFC) account, which supports the construction phase of the Ocean Observatories Initiative, is stressed; infrastructure support costs covered by OCE (ships and other facility operations and maintenance costs) are increasing relative to top-line OCE funding; and NSF as a whole is developing more directed science initiatives, such as Science, Engineering and Education for Sustainability (SEES)...

Walter Brown, a member of our advisory board and a longtime friend and supporter of Lamont, was the recipient this week of the National Maritime Historical Society's David A. O'Neil Sheet Anchor Award. He was honored Wednesday evening at a gala dinner at the NY Yacht Club in midtown. Chuck Callan, another member of our board, together with the
Purdys, the Ryans, and a few other Lamonters, were able to celebrate with Walter. Not being a sailor, I had to look up the definition of "sheet anchor." It definitely fits Walter's character. Congratulations, Walter!...

Once each year, the USS Constitution, the world's oldest, floating, commissioned warship in the US Navy, is towed from her dock in Boston Harbor and then berthed in the opposite direction to ensure that she weathers evenly. Once each year, the LDEO Borehole Logging Truck is brought out for Open House demonstrations, and afterwards returned to its parking spot. It has weathered quite evenly, thank you very much...

This week was spent on the  director search matters, preparing for next week's Langseth review at NSF, celebrating Adrienne Block's successful defense, and honoring Rusty Lotti for her years of service to the Core Repository and Lamont...

I hope you've been able to dry out since last weekend. Irene cut quite a swath. The city seemed to survive; I live in a high-rise in "Zone B" on the West Side and was watching the storm surge lap up and over the aprons of some of the piers on Sunday morning. By that afternoon, the wind was coming in from the west. Things seemed calm, so I opened a west-facing casement window to get some air. Dumb move: my windows open inward and sure enough every loose thing in my living room got blown away. I had to put on sneakers in order to get enough grip on the floor to push the window closed. Still, I was lucky; I know some of you lost power or were flooded or were stranded somewhere. I'm just glad none of you were hurt.

A few Lamont proposals over the past several months have required some extra steps because they involved research on human subjects and required a signoff on research protocols. Legal protections of human subjects, in any country, are rigorous, and apply to a wide range of potential research. Columbia maintains an Institutional Review Board (IRB), which is charged with the review and approval of protocols. There is a web site (http://www.columbia.edu/cu/irb/index.html) with FAQs and other guidance. In addition, Bev is organizing an information session with representatives of the IRB, to be held soon after the start of the fall semester. Point of clarification: Lamont Research Professors do not need waivers to request IRB approval. Make sure your title is entered correctly when you make the application...

Our summer interns celebrated the completion of their program this week, with short presentations, a poster session, and a barbeque on the Comer deck. This was the 22^nd year of the internship program in its current configuration, with Dallas Abbott in the lead. The program has evolved to include lectures on research methods and ethics, in addition to the usual menu of science entrees, and it should be recognized as one of the leading earth science intern programs in the country. This year, with the help of our Development team, we invited the parents of the interns and intern alumni to participate in last-day activities. One of the parents, a professor at a well-known college with an outstanding reputation, remarked on the excellence of our program and the enthusiasm of interns and mentors alike. Agreed! Thanks to the many folks who make this program the success it is, and thanks to the agencies, the PIs, and the Earth Institute for continuing their support...

Kim Martineau and David Funkhouser, with input from Maya Tolstoy and Jim Gaherty, organized a TV Media training workshop on Tuesday. I wasn't able to attend, but I heard it went well. (I was visiting some of our donors in their Park Avenue offices that morning. It's a parallel universe, but that's a tale for another time.) Given the importance of our science to public discourse and the frequent need to respond to press inquiries, we should be supportive of our media team's efforts to help us deliver our message appropriately, professionally, to various audiences and through traditional and "new media" outlets. Although it takes a lot of effort to organize one of these workshops, I hope we can run them on a regular basis...