Best Student Paper Awards
Each year a committee of faculty and students undertakes the difficult task of choosing the best journal articles from the many high-quality papers written by VIMS graduate students. Each paper considered is either accepted, in press, or published in a high-quality, peer-reviewed journal. The papers reflect the superb quality of the research conducted by VIMS students and the outstanding mentoring of their advisors. Papers are judged for the scope of problem, degree of challenge, magnitude of student effort, hypothesis formulation and testing, and writing style.
This year, the committee members—Donna Bilkovic, Rich Brill, Matt Kirwan, Abigail Sisti, and Ryan Carnegie—evaluated 11 papers.
Ph.D. Category
This year’s winner of best paper by a Ph.D. student goes to Andrew Johnson for “The role of sexual reproduction in the maintenance of established Zostera marina meadows” in Journal of Ecology.
In his paper, co-authored by JJ Orth and Ken Moore, Andrew combined a field survey and experiments to examine the importance of sexual reproduction in existing Z. marina populations, which has not been well understood. He found that seedlings produced via sexual reproduction do recruit in existing seagrass meadows but are challenged by competition from existing vegetation. Sexual reproduction in Z. marina may be most important for maintaining bottom cover where gaps are produced by disturbance. Andrew’s elegant work sheds new light on this important marine species, and may help us better manage the conservation and restoration of Z. marina in changing marine environments.
Master's Category
This year’s choice for the best paper by a Master’s student goes to Bruce Pfirrmann for "Ecosystem services of restored oyster reefs in a Chesapeake Bay tributary: abundance and foraging of estuarine fishes.”
Bruce’s paper appeared in Marine Ecology Progress Series and was co-authored by Rochelle Seitz. It describes a field study that examined fish abundance and feeding on restored oyster reefs. The paper highlighted the challenge in assessing services provided by restored oyster reefs. Because different metrics may provide different and conflicting perspective, the authors found, measurement of a range of responses is essential.