Research Leads to Award-Winning Film, Helps Whales

Eric Keen, NSF Graduate Research Fellow CREDIT: NSF. View full size image

This ScienceLives article was provided to LiveScience in partnership with the National Science Foundation.

Marine biologist Eric Keen, who found time to produce an award-winning video while researching whales in the fjords of the Great Bear Rainforestin British Columbia, is a graduate student at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego. He is participating in whale research conducted by the North Coast Cetacean Society, a nonprofit research center in Hartley Bay, B.C. The research seeks to further our basic understanding of fin whales, killer whales and humpback whales as part of an effort to identify the effects of threats such as increased tanker traffic and climate change. "For a developing region like this, baseline info is like gold, you've got to rush to get it before it's too late," he says in the 90-second video, which took first place in the 2013 NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program 60th anniversary video contest. "Without it, it's impossible to assess human impacts or inform marine policy."

[Grad Student Makes Film About His Whale Research ]

Name: Eric Keen
Institution: UC San Diego
Field of Study: Marine Biology

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