Navigating project planning and collaborating with a research lab in New South Wales, Australia

The acceptance and funding to conduct research in another country is an amazing opportunity, but comes with numerous responsibilities that can make the experience difficult to navigate. As a member of ASLO’s 4^th cohort of Limnology and Oceanology Research exchange (LOREX), I was able to conduct research with Southern Cross Universities’ Centre for Coastal Biogeochemistry (CCB). With acceptance to the program in January, I had 4 months to plan for the 8-week time slot that I had to conduct research in Lismore Australia. This included finding flights and housing, applying for a visa, and collaborating with scientists at the CCB to determine how I would conduct field collection, laboratory sampling and instrumental analysis within a short time frame. This was done across a 14-hour time difference, making communication with my hosts difficult. Upon arriving, collaboration with members of the CCB was done with more ease, but there were numerous hoops to jump through at the university administration level. Despite these challenges, the experience was rewarding. I was able to collect sufficient data that I will be planning to use to release a publication on a carbon dioxide removal method, and to develop into a chapter of my PhD dissertation. Regarding collaborative research, this experience gave me the opportunity to network with numerous researchers that were conducting their own projects, and through this networking I was able to get access to further research opportunities with the CCB.

Presentation Preference: Poster

Primary Presenter: James Westphalen, Georgia Southern University (westphalenjames@gmail.com)

Authors:

James Westphalen, Georgia Southern University  (westphalenjames@gmail.com)