Cynthia Ahearn In Her Element...

Tribute: The Legacy of Cynthia Ahearn

Narcissia ahearnae (Ophidiasteridae) from the western Tropical Atlantic

An obituary summarizing Cynthia Ahearn's passing is here.

This is probably not the best summary of Cynthia Ahearn's complete professional contribution, she was one of those people who had far more impact on the field then a paper trail would reveal.

She influenced students, scientists, and visitors..and encouraged the Echinoblog's existence. But I thought it was important that everyone see her tangible contributions.

Anyone who has more or would like to add a story, a contribution, or comment is welcome to do so. I will forward all such statements to John Ahearn.

*Identification of nearly 300,000 echinoderm specimen lots (this is an estimate-there are likely more). One of the few people in the world who had seen almost every echinoderm specimen in the NMNH collections.

*A completely (or near completely) cataloged collection for the NMNH Echinodermata including types.

*Verification of all the types in the NMNH collections (what is present, what condition, how many, etc.).

*Curated NMNH echinoderm collections for over 30 years!

*Editor, writer, and assembler of the original print version of the International Echinoderm Newsletter from 1993-2003.

*Editor of the Virtual Echinoderm Newsletter (designed by Susan Hottenrott)

*Tours of the NMNH Invertebrate Zoology Department collections and educational experiences to generations of students-from high school to undergraduate to high-level officials.

*Hosted international visitors from Mexico, Colombia, South Africa, Australia, Russia and undoubtedly many more then I am aware of..

*Published collaborative research with scientists from Australia, Mexico, Chile, Colombia, Russia, as well as with NMNH curator Dave Pawson.

*Provided professional taxonomic expertise to major scientific institutions around the world, including Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the National Marine Fisheries Service, New Zealands Institute of Water & Atmosphere (Wellington, New Zealand), the California Academy of Sciences (in San Francisco, CA), the Museum of Comparative Zoology, the Museum Victoria (in Melbourne, Australia) and many more.

Publications:

O'Loughlin, M. and C. Aheam . 2005. A review of pygal-furrowed Synallactidae (Echinodermata: Holothuriodea), with new species from the Antarctic, Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Memoirs of the Museum Victoria 62(2): 147-179.
Alicia Durán-González, Alfredo Laguarda-Figueras, Francisco A Solís-Marin, Blanca Estela Buitrón Sánchez, Cynthia Gust Ahearn, Juan Torres-Vega. 2005. Echinoderms (Echinodermata) from the Mexican waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Revista de Biologia Tropical 53(3): 53-68.
Alfredo Laguarda-Figueras, Francisco A Solis-Marín, Alicia Durán-González, Cynthia Gust Ahearn, Blanca Estela Buitrón Sánchez, Juan Torres-Vega .2005. Echinoderms (Echinodermata) of the Mexican Caribbean. Revista de Biologia Tropical 53(3): 109-122.
Francisco A Solís-Marín, Alfredo Laguarda-Figueras, Alicia Durán-González, Cynthia Gust Ahearn, Juan Torres Vega. 2005. Echinoderms (Echinodermata) from the Gulf of California, Mexico. Revista de Biologia Tropical 53(3): 123-137.

Pawson, D.L., D.J. Vance, and C. Ahearn. 2001. Western Atlantic sea cucumbers of the order Molpadiida (Echinodermata; Holothuroidea). Bulletin of the Biological Society of Washington 10: 311-327.
Pawson, D.L. and C. Ahearn 2001. Bathyal Echinoderms of the Galapagos Islands. In: Echinoderms 2000, Barker (ed.) Swets & Zeitlinger, Lisse, pp. 41-46.
Ahearn, C. Gust. 1995. Catalog of the type specimens of sea stars (Echinodermata: Asteroidea) in the National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution. Smithsonian Contributions to Zoology, No. 572:59 pp.
Ahearn, C. 1994. Family Psolidae: new distributional records from the Antarctic. pp. 503, In Echinoderms Through Time, Proceedings of the Eighth International Echinoderm Conference, Dijon, France. David, Guille, Feral & Roux (eds). Balkema, Rotterdam.
Ahearn, C. 1992. Philippine brittle stars (Echinodermata: Ophiuroidea) described by R. Koehler (1922): A corrected and annotated list of type specimens. Smithsonian Contributions to Zoology, No. 537:15 pp.
Pawson, D.L. and C. Gust. 1981. Holothuria (Platyperona) rowei, a new sea cucumber from Florida (Echinodermata, Holothuroidea). Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington 94(3): 873-877.

Cynthia Ahearn Passes Away

It is with great sadness that I must report that Cynthia Ahearn at the National Museum of Natural Museum passed away today (Sunday, August 31st).

Cynthia Anne Gust Ahearn was born October 17, 1952, in Minneapolis, MN. A graduate of Dunbarton College of the Holy Cross, Washington D.C., she began her Smithsonian career in 1973 as a Museum Specialist, Department of Invertebrate Zoology, National Museum of Natural History. At the time of her death, Cynthia curated the Smithsonian’s extensive collection of echinoderms (sea stars), and was conducting research projects on shallow water, deep water and Antarctic sea cucumbers. Cynthia was a pioneer in the Natural History Museum’s public education outreach program. She developed the popular Echinoderm Discovery Cart, which entertains and educates thousands of museum visitors, young and old alike, hosted a segment of the Discovery Channel’s ‘Young Scientist’ Program, and spoke to the Smithsonian Board of Regents, the Department of Agriculture School of Continuing Education, the Wellesley alumna society, and to local schools and universities. Each year Cynthia hosted scientists and students from around the world in her home while they conducted research at the museum. In 2005, she was presented the Natural History Museum’s Public Outreach Award, and in 2007, a new species of seastar (Narcissia ahearnae) was named in her honor in recognition of her achievements in curation of the echinoderm collection, her research on echinoderms, and in facilitating the research of so many visitors over the years.

Cindy is survived by her husband John.

Cindy was a good friend to me and always had a cheerful thing to say about everything I did and had a positive thing to say about everyone else. She was intelligent, insightful and observant in a way that few people are.

She supported echinoderm research with a pride and an energy that was hard to follow. She did it all-curation, identification of specimens, hosting visitors, measurement of specimens, gathering data for databases.

She was one of a kind. A friend. A wonderful person. A scientist and an echinoderm biologist par excellence. She thought of other people before herself and was an example for people that many could learn from.

She will be greatly missed.

The Wisdom of Miscellaneous Junk in an Echinoderm Scientist's Office

Everybody has weird stuff in their office. Here is a bunch of weird odds and ends...all of which have some professional bearing....but all come with some wisdom and lessons for alll!

1. Ethanol!
So..in my field..you get a lot of ethanol. For preservation, fixation of specimens and what-have you. This is probably just your basic dilution of 75%..but when you get up to 95%?? It strips wax off tables, does horrible things to plastic.

Sometimes you have to be careful about working without gloves too long in the day...lest the ethanol seep into your skin and cause uh...."ethanolic effects" from too much fixed starfish...


2. Bleach!
101 Household Uses! Primarily for disarticulating echinoderm endoskeletons into their component ossicles. But don't let it go for too long!! Weak bleach just does NOT break down ambulacrals the way that new, fresh bleach does!!

Plus be careful disarticulating ossicles when wearing sheik black, or otherwise dark colored clothing....lest it become a sheik, bleach-splattered smock!!!

3. Toilet Paper!

Useful for sopping up the moisture for dryin' out those specimens!! A surprisingly indispensible tool. But one of those things that always gets a strange look from visitors...

4. I hate Cotton!
So, let me educate all those people out there who are drying echinoderms?
DON'T USE COTTON!! DON'T USE COTTON!!! COTTON IS BAD!! BAD!!
(well...except maybe for holothurians).

Basically, cotton is made up of a whole bunch of little fibers. Echinoderm stereom usually has a bunch of tiny spinelets or bunches of other little natural snag-prone features...pedicellariae, ossicles, spines, what-have you.

You put any kind of echinoderm with a dry skeleton into contact with cotton..and it will make off with all the fine stuff..snagged into the cotton. It never truly ever gets cleared off and is just A royal PAIN in the butt to deal with.

So there.

NO COTTON for ECHINODERMS!! (well...except the sea cucumbers...but you have to be careful...)


5. BEWARE THE TOOTHBRUSH.
Quite possibly one of the grossest things in my office is this toothbrush sitting around my sink, which fortunately, has never been accidentally used by anyone....yet!!

You will often find stiff-bristled toothbrushes in the offices of many an-echinoderm taxonomists and morphologists.

These are used in conjunction with bleach to clean off accessory structures so that you can see the plates of various animals...This is used on starfish, sea urchins, ophiuroids, and who knows what else..

Downside is you often end up doing this on VERY old or very trashed specimens that have usually dried or just preserved poorly...So you get to accrete the weird, brown stuff and/or other uggy organic tissue which is just, uh.... well bleargh.

So, there you have it, your lesson of the day about Why You Should NOT use a Toothbrush in an Echinoderm Biologists' Room.....

THAT is one big ass brittle star!

At the CAS collections with a specimen of Ophiopsammus maculata from New Zealand.

Echinoblog: Foggy San Francisco Edition

This week I am visiting San Francisco to tie up some research loose ends at the California Academy of Sciences and get in some R & R.
Note the substantial difference in August weather in San Francisco, CA !! vs. the very sunny, hot, 90ish degree, humid weather one encounters in Washington, DC!! That is actual FOG. I don' t get to see REAL fog any more. So..I'm jazzed to have it around this week!

The New California Academy of Sciences
The Academy is just recently returning to its historic home in Golden Gate Park after about 6 years or so in downtown San Francisco at an interim facility. The new building is a fantastic engineering feat! And you can read about it everywhere, including Wired , USA Today, and heck! Even Popular Mechanics!
Although there has been a LOT of PR, much of the internal details are still hush-hush. But here's a snippet. They introduced two of the alligators (one of which was a rare white, albino alligator speceis) to their new Swamp Pit Exhibit while I was visiting.
and of course, there's always Flickr...

I have a long history with the Invertebrate Zoology & Geology Department at the California Academy of Sciences. My masters degree research was performed here in conjunction with San Francisco State University.

Back in 1995 or thereabouts, I began volunteering in IZ & G and later began working as a "curatorial assistant" and ended up sorting, identifying and curating the entire asteroid+ophiuroid collection. So, you could say, I "cut my teeth" here...
I still return regularly to collect data, tie up some loose ends and regularly identify specimens for the CAS collections. And with the growth of the CAS collections-they always have something for me to do..
People

I also visit to enjoy professional discussions with the first-class research staff, including my former advisor Dr. Richard Mooi, one of the world experts on sand dollars, sea urchins and echinoderm phylogeny in general. Here's a shot from his new office!

Other luminaries in the department that I always enjoying talking to:

Peter Roopnarine. The new paleontologist/paleobiologist/all-around math dude. He writes this nifty climate change blog but mostly works on evolution, paleoclimate and various aspects of bivalve systematics and evolution.

Terry Gosliner, who works on the systmatics of nudibranchs-primarily in the Indo-Pacific but his work carries him all over. Terry's opisthobranch lab is the largest and one of the most productive for his group in North America.

Rebecca Johnson, a postdoctoral scholar in Terry Gosliner's lab.

Gary Williams, octocoral specialist and current department chair.

Collections staff: Bob Van Syoc & Jean deMouthe-Collection Managers, Liz Kools and Chrissy Piotrowski (collections technicians) are also ever-welcome to put up with my demands and listen to my off-beat stories!!

Collections
The CAS-IZG collections have an interesting mix of fossils, minerals, and of course, one of the largest collections of west coast and Pacific invertebrates to be found anywhere in the world.

Echinoderms make up a huge chunk of those collections and many of their holdings are closely tied to the history of marine biology and natural sciences in California.

Here for example, is a specimen of Heliaster kubiniji, an asteroid from Baja California collected by Ed "Doc" Ricketts of Cannery Row fame.

Echinoderm holdings are strongest for fossil & living echinoids and asteroids with good collection representation for holothurians and crinoids. Most of the fossil collections for echinoderms is relatively young, but there's some older material available. Click here to check out their online collections database.

The new facility is awesome with new wet-lab space, metal compactor cabinets and shelving, secure climate controlled areas and inevitably, Wi-Fi all around for immediate database access.
Oddly enough, enormously huge, mutant amphipods keep on finding their way into things!!


I'll post a few more pix over the next few days!!

Goniasterid Friday: playing with the new camera....

Happy Friday! Goniaster tessellatus from the tropical Atlantic...playing around with my new camera...




next week...Blogging from San Francisco, California!!!