Tina Tennessen

Tina Tennessen
Tina Tennessen
Tina Tennessen

Tina Tennessen has a background in radio journalism and loves hearing a good story. She is a science writer, web editor, and a former radio producer. Before joining the Ocean Portal team as a web content and social media producer in early 2011, she held the position of Public Affairs Officer at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC) in Edgewater, Md. While at SERC, Tina created and edited a news blog called Shorelines and publicized Smithsonian research and educational programs, generating press coverage and public attention for issues such as ocean acidification, hypoxia, invasive species, sea-level rise, shoreline development, and over-fishing. Tina grew up near five of Minnesota's 10,000 lakes and feels fortunate to be working among marine scientists who have dedicated their lives to understanding the underwater realm and the issues that affect it.

Collaborator Contributions

Sound artist Halsey Burgund performs his composition Ocean Voices.

Sound Artist Halsey Burgund

Halsey Burgund (right) performing Ocean Voices before a live audience at the Museum of Science, Boston, in July 2010. The composition includes excerpts of ocean stories from around the world. Burgund has been recording these stories on the Ocean Voices' website and mobile phone app.

Photo of a Hawaiian monk seal on the beach, with the ocean in the background.

The Endangered Hawaiian Monk Seal

Scientists from the U.S. and Greece are working from opposite sides of the ocean to save the Hawaiian (pictured here) and Mediterranean monk seals. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species has declared both species to be critically endangered.

Map of Oceana's 2011 expedition to the Baltic Sea

Map of Oceana's 2011 Baltic Expedition

In 2011, Oceana researchers spent two months surveying life and conditions in the Baltic Sea. The team covered more than 7,000 nautical miles and completed more than 130 dives. The data, samples, video, and photos they gathered may inform the expansion of marine protected areas. See some of the plants and animals the team found in a photo gallery of the expedition.

A photo of baby sea turtles on a beach in Jalisco, Mexico.

Baby Sea Turtles in Jalisco, Mexico

These baby olive ridleys (Lepidochelys olivacea) will eventually provide a home to crustaceans, mollusks, and other epibionts. That's according to a survey of epibionts living on mature, nesting olive ridleys and green sea turtles in Jalisco, Mexico. The related study was published in the October 2011 issue of the Bulletin of the Peabody Museum of Natural History. Read about the study on our blog. 

<p>Amanda Feuerstein with a nesting olive ridley (<em><strong><a href="http://eol.org/pages/1056177/overview">Lepidochelys olivacea</a></strong></em>). Feuerstein is a co-author of a study that surveyed algae, crustaceans, mollusks, and other epibionts that live on the turtles in the Pacific Ocean.</p>

Searching for Life -- Epibionts -- On Sea Turtles

Amanda Feuerstein with a nesting olive ridley (Lepidochelys olivacea). Feuerstein is a co-author of a study that surveyed algae, crustaceans, mollusks, and other epibionts that live on olive ridley and green sea turtles in the Pacific Ocean. You can read about the study on the Ocean Portal blog.

A composite photograph of three of the crustaceans found living on olive ridley and green turtles in the Pacific.

Crustacean Epibionts

In a 2011 study published in the Bulletin of the Peabody Museum of Natural History, researchers documented a number of different organisms living on olive ridley and green turtles in the Pacific. Of these "epibionts," crustaceans made up more than 40% of those observed. Some are depicted here: Planes major (A & B), Podocerus chelonophilus (C), and Balaenophilus manatorum (D).

A photo of an arid ocean cliff in Chile's Atacama Desert with the ocean below.

Exploring Chile's Marine Fossil Record in the Atacama Desert

Smithsonian curator of fossil marine mammals Nick Pyenson and a team of collaborators are heading into Chile's Atacama Desert, shown here. They'll study a rich bonebed of fossil marine vertebrates that lived off the Chilean coast around 8 million years ago.

A photo of zebra mussels clinging together, the mollusks have successfully invaded brackish and freshwater areas across North America.

Zebra Mussels (Dreissena polymorpha)

This bivalve mollusk is native to the Caspian Sea, lagoons of the Black Sea, and their inflowing rivers. It lives in fresh and brackish water and cannot tolerate full seawater. In the 18th and 19th centuries, zebra mussels spread through European canals, reaching the Baltic Sea and many European river estuaries.

A photo of a sea walnut, a ctenophore.

Sea Walnut (Mnemiopsis leidyi)

This ctenophore (a stingless jellyfish-like animal) is native to the east coast of North and South America. In 1982, it was discovered in the Black Sea, where it was transported by ballast water. It subsequently spread to the Caspian Sea. In both places it multiplied and formed immense populations. The sea walnuts contributed to the collapse of local fisheries because they feed on zooplankton that the commercial fish also consume.

A close-up photo of Killer Algae, Caulerpa taxifolia, a seaweed that has proven to be a successful invasive species.

Killer Algae (Caulerpa taxifolia)

A strain of this green seaweed, native to the Indian and Pacific Oceans, escaped public and private aquariums in California, Japan, Australia, and Monaco. It has spread widely in the Mediterranean, replacing native plants and depriving marine life of food and habitat.