Grant: Major Resources Support Program - Infrastructure

The Bamfield Marine Sciences Centre (BMSC) began operations in 1972 in the abandoned Pacific Cable Station. It is has matured into ann internationally regarded research and training facility in the coastal and marine sciences. BMSC provides essential research support to distinguished senior scientists and young researchers from across Canada and 11 other countries. BMSC also hosts industry scientists and government researchers from the B.C. Ministry of Environment, the Pacific Geosciences Centre, the Dept. of Fisheries and Oceans, and innovative aquaculture companies. As well, BMSC is an active partner in the NEPTUNE ocean-science project. Scientists are attracted by Bamfield's extraordinary natural laboratory with coastal rainforest, rocky shores, and sea waters that support a stunning diversity of marine life. Therefore, BMSC research ranges from studies of deep ocean water to fresh water lakes and salmon-rearing rivers; from rocky shores to rain forest settings; from jellyfish ion channels to shark physiology; from ocean-climate coupling to the ecology of shorebirds. BMSC's research capacity is substantially increased with new facilities including a Fluid Dynamics Laboratory with a 12 m flume and sophisticated visualization system, and the Rix Centre for Ocean Discovery. This partly explains why BMSC productivity measured in refereed publications has almost doubled over the last six years. Now BMSC is capitalizing on its four decades of research and creating a new research initiative to capture and share the data that have been collected by an army of researchers. This will begin with a new collections database and be expanded to include 30 identified long-term datasets. In addition, an array of near-shore sensors will provide continuous data from around Barkley Sound. These new research platforms will provide an unmatched resource for studies of global change and its consequences for the marine realm.