Rutgers Names Francisco Werner Director of the Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences

J. Frederick Grassle, founding director, will return to faculty

New Brunswick, N.J. – Francisco Werner, an oceanographer well known for his work in ocean-modeling, has been appointed director of the Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences (IMCS) at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey. He succeeds J. Frederick Grassle, the institute’s founding director, who will return to teaching and research.

Werner, an expert in the mathematical modeling of physical and biological processes in coastal oceans and shallow seas, has taught marine science at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill since 1993, and served as department chair for seven years. From 2002 to 2007 he chaired the Scientific Steering Committee of Global Ocean Ecosystem Dynamics (GLOBEC), an International Geosphere-Biosphere Program of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

“I’m excited about coming to Rutgers, where the IMCS, thanks to Fred Grassle and his colleagues, has earned a reputation for pioneering oceanographic research,” Werner said. “It’s the right place to be at just the right time. Oceanography is a fairly young science – just about a century old – but it’s becoming a mature science. Curiosity still drives us, but we know enough about the oceans now that we can start to draw conclusions about them, and start to communicate those conclusions to the public.”

 Richard L. McCormick, president of Rutgers, said Werner is particularly well-suited to face the challenges of maintaining IMCS’s excellence while expanding its role. “We’re in the process of planning a new facility for our earth, atmospheric and ocean scientists, and Cisco Werner, who had a lot to do with planning and building the new Science Complex at the University of North Carolina, will have a chance to put that experience to work at IMCS,” McCormick said. “Fred Grassle created the IMCS and made it what it is; Cisco Werner will help us build on that foundation, literally as well as figuratively.”

Robert M. Goodman, executive dean of the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences, of which the IMCS is part, said Werner, a widely respected scholar in ocean modeling, is a pioneer in putting technology to use in the service of oceanography. “He has exactly the right expertise and experience to build on the world-class oceanographic research organization that Fred Grassle has built, essentially, from the ground up,” Goodman said. “The IMCS is distinctive among its peer institutions in its commitment to integrative, interdisciplinary science coupled to a focus on service to society, in New Jersey and globally.”

Grassle, an internationally recognized expert in the study of ocean-bottom life (benthic ecology), came to Rutgers from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in 1989. At the time, oceanography and related studies were scattered around the university. Grassle’s task was to bring together scholars from various disciplines – such as biology, geology and climate research. – in a single place and give their research and teaching a new focus.

“I wanted the institute to be truly interdisciplinary, with real strengths, not just in biology, which is my background, but in chemistry, physics, and geology,” Grassle said.

Grassle also recruited a long list of talented scholars to the institute – among them, Dale Haidvogel, the eminent ocean modeler; Paul Falkowski, now Board of Governors Professor of Geological and Marine Sciences and head of the Rutgers University Energy Institute; Scott Glenn, leader of the Coastal Ocean Observation Laboratory; Sybil Seitzinger, a world expert on nitrogen biogeochemistry; and many others.

Werner said he plans to continue and expand Grassle’s emphasis on interdisciplinary scholarship at IMCS. “The questions we’re exploring in oceanography, and the answers we’re finding, have social, political, economic and technical ramifications,” Werner said. “So I look forward to expanding our collaboration with engineers and social scientists, as well as with other natural scientists.”

Werner, a native of Maracaibo, Venezuela, received his Ph.D. from the University of Washington and taught at Dartmouth College and Georgia’s Skidaway Institute of Oceanography before joining the faculty at the University of North Carolina.

Media Contact: Ken Branson
732-932-7084, x633
E-mail: kbranson@ur.rutgers.edu