Team Bio

The broader COLaB team is made up of physical, biological and chemical oceanographers, from all over the world and with many years of experience, as well as engineers, designers and modellers. We share common interests in democratizing oceanography and in addressing the world's need for standardised coastal ocean observations. The current project team includes those who will organise or be involved in the training and fieldwork in Ghana, as well as representatives from the Ghanaian host team.

Greg Cowie

I am an oceanographer and biogeochemist at the University of Edinburgh. Over the years, my teaching and research have led me to develop portable packages of instruments that I have used in diverse locations, from the Indian Ocean to the Caribbean. The principle has been to train undergraduate students in field and analytical methods, in order to collect good data for numerous types of oceanographic studies, often in remote settings, without the need for expensive equipment or a formal research vessel or laboratory. It is this experience that I hope to bring to the present project.

Benjamin Osei Botwe

I am a chemical oceanographer at the Department of Marine and Fisheries Sciences, University of Ghana with over 10 years of university teaching and research experience. My scientific research has focused on the assessment of anthropogenic impacts on coastal and marine ecosystems. I am currently involved in projects that seek to understand and build resilience of coastal communities to climate change and diarrhoea, coastal flooding and erosion in Ghana. I also have interest in the use of low-cost tools to monitor chemical, biological and physical phenomena in estuaries and other parts of the Ghana coast, which are being impacted by artisanal gold mining in Ghana.

Jethan d'Hotman

As an oceanographer, with a keen interest in instrumentation, I have a passion for developing new methods and tools while making my work accessible to the broader public. I am the co-chair of the Ocean Best Practices Task Team for developing best practices for Coastal Observations in under-resourced countries.

Juliet Hermes

I'm a physical coastal and offshore oceanographer, manager, modeller, observer, surfer.

I'm passionate about co-design, knowledge sharing, diversity, inclusivity and ensuring we build on capacity in under resourced countries

Lon Porter

I am passionate about helping the STEM community of educators recognize the increasingly powerful way 3D printing and digital design is providing a new generation of tools for active learning in the classroom, laboratory, and field. In 2014, I founded the Wabash College 3D Printing and Fabrication Center (3D-PFC), one of the first fabrication resources for developing and producing low-cost analytical instrumentation for undergraduate STEM teaching and learning. My research primarily focuses on the development of customizable, user friendly analytical instruments (colorimeters, fluorimeters, etc.) with excellent performance for low costs. More recent work involves adapting low-cost and user-friendly 3D printed analytical instruments for detection of environmentally significant chemical species.

Lucie Cocquempot

My background is in physical oceanography and my job is to connect ocean-observing communities and encourage sustainable observation networks through collective intelligence projects.

Together with Jethan, I am co-chairing a Best Practices Task Team developing best practices for Coastal Observations in under-resourced countries.

Thomas Bornman

I am a marine ecologist with expertise in phytoplankton, microphytobenthos, salt marshes and the physico-chemical processes that influence their composition, distribution and growth.

I am passionate about the design, implementation and management of long-term coastal observation networks and hope to see these observations expanded, especially in under-resourced countries around the world.