World Nature Conservation Day
Florida Atlantic: Collaboration for Conservation

A unique partnership between the FAU Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute and Thermo Fisher Scientific, the world leader in serving science, will enable researchers to advance marine science and conserve endangered species worldwide from the tropics to the Arctic.

As part of the public-private collaboration, Thermo Fisher is helping FAU Harbor Branch’s efforts by supporting development of a laboratory infrastructure that includes the latest genetic analysis platforms, which are essential to advance studies on marine ecosystems at the molecular level. FAU Harbor Branch will assess Thermo Fisher’s technology and provide feedback on how the platforms may be optimized for applications in the fields of marine science and species conservation.

“We needed to replace our laboratory’s workhorse, the Applied Biosystems 3130 Genetic Analyzer. However, it was challenging to find the funding to replace this critical tool,” said Greg O’Corry-Crowe, Ph.D., a research professor at FAU Harbor Branch and leader of the Wildlife Evolution and Behavior program. “Without the analyzer, our team couldn’t make progress on a series of critical projects. So, we approached Thermo Fisher with a novel idea of accessing essential equipment in return for our insights on how their technology could better serve efforts to solve growing wildlife and environmental issues.”