GEOLOGICAL SCIENCES AT BROWN UNIVERSITY
ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE > MARINE BIOLOGICAL LAB

MBL Collaborative Program
The Joint Program between Brown University and the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole (MBL) prepares young scholars to lead the nation and the world in the biological and environmental sciences.

Through collaborative efforts in teaching and research, the faculties of the two institutions provide a unique educational and research environment that combines in-depth disciplinary scholarship with interdisciplinary approaches. Graduate applicants should seek admission through cooperating Brown departments, and indicate their interest in the Joint Program at the time of their application. All students in the Joint Program will have an MBL faculty co-advisor. A period of residency on the MBL campus will vary according to the research program of each student.

Three groups in Geological Sciences have strong links to MBL: Environmental Science, Earth System History, and Planetary Sciences. The Ecosystems Center at MBL has a distinguished record of studying biogeochemical cycling in the coastal zone. This complements research at Brown investigating both physical and biochemical processes in New England estuaries (Brown Geological Sciences Professors Herbert, Mustard, and Prell. In addition, MBL has a record of leading scholarship with a number of Long Term Ecological Reserves. These provide unique opportunities for field studies and retrospective looks at the long-term response of ecosystems to both natural and human-induced changes. Research in the Department of Geological Sciences on molecular isotopic approaches to studying the physiology of aquatic plants (Geological Sciences Professor Yongsong Huang) has strong links with MBL faculty interested in biogeochemical cycling.

A second major strand that connects MBL and Geological Sciences at Brown involves collaboration between the genomics group at MBL and our Planetary group. Modern genetic studies probe the deep branches of life. This work complements interests in the ESH and Planetary groups on the origin of primitive organic compounds, on the origin of life on Earth, and the potential for simple life to exist elsewhere in the solar system. A NASA-funded astrobiology project combines the interests of researchers in Geological Sciences at Brown (Professors Head and Mustard) and at MBL (led by Dr. Mitchell Sogin).