Biography

Calling all ham radio operators: the Federal Communications Commission has authorized special event callsign W4U to operate 29 August-11 September 2021. This special event station, the ‘Gulf of Mexico Underwater Forests’, will educate the worldwide amateur radio community about a unique 60,000-year forest discovered off the coast of Alabama. With funding from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), a team of researchers from Northeastern University and the University of Utah, with expert assistance from the Dauphin Island Sea Laboratory, are exploring this unique site. The scientists are using scuba diving and marine robots to explore the forest. Samples recovered are analyzed by the Ocean Genome Legacy at Northeastern, the world’s largest repository of tissue samples and genetic information from marine organisms. This ancient wood, now exposed on the seafloor, is being fed upon by shipworms, a kind of mollusk that often harbor unique microbes in their guts. Some of these microbes maybe useful in developing compounds to treat cancer or as new antibiotics.

On September 7 and 8, 2021, from 10 AM - 4 PM EDT, a ham radio station will be set up on the lawn in front of the Marine Science Center, 430 Nahant Rd., Nahant, MA 01908. Prof. Mark Patterson (WB2OIL) who is a co-principal investigator on this project, Ocean Genome Legacy staff, and the Northeastern Marine Science Center community, will be on hand to answer any questions about the underwater forest research. We’ll discuss the remarkable animals that live in the Alabama Undersea Forest in the Gulf of Mexico, the importance of marine DNA repositories and so much more! Members of the public who have never seen a ham radio station in operation are welcome to stop by and perhaps make contact to ham radio operators thousands of miles away! Former NOAA Corps officer Junie Cassone, N1DUC, will be co-operating W4U and will be on hand to talk about the NOAA Corps and her adventures at sea conducting marine research. Junie was profiled in the September 2021 issue of QST, the official publication of the American Radio Relay League.

We will dive deep into this unique underwater forest and what it can tell us about both the past and the future. Researchers have estimated that this ancient cypress forest grew 60,000 years ago based on counting tree rings and dating pollen and sand found at the site. The impeccable preservation of these trees is a result of their long-term burial beneath 10 feet of sediment. The strong winds and rough seas of Hurricane Ivan in 2004 uncovered the hidden wood and whole communities of living organisms moved in and took up residence. The undersea forest is not only an important home for these critters, but also gives us an amazing glimpse into the past of North America. The remaining trees are now 60 feet below sea level and may provide important clues into the fate of forested coastlines as sea levels continue to rise.

You can check out this ongoing research at:
https://oceanexplorer.noaa.gov/explorations/20ancient-forest/welcome.html

For hams worldwide who want to make contact with W4U: look for us on 160-10 m on CW, SSB, and FT8 digital modes. If you want to see pictures of the underwater robots used in this research visit WB2OIL’s page at https://www.qrz.com/lookup/WB2OIL. For stations that make contact, a special QSL card, available from https://eqsl.cc/ is available for this event. The QSL card includes URLs to learn more about the NOAA-funded research on the underwater forest and drug discovery.

These URLs are:

https://tinyurl.com/NOAAdrugdiscovery

https://tinyurl.com/sunkenforest

https://tinyurl.com/underwaterforest; and

https://tinyurl.com/OGLMSC

Finally, why is a special event station in New England using "4" in its callsign? We originally planned for this event to be held at our operational partner in Alabama, the Dauphin Island Sea Laboratory. However, the pandemic had other plans for us, so we had to pivot back to our homebase here in Boston. CU on the air!

Equipment

Elecraft KX1 QRP transceiver (4 W) that I built for 20, 30, 40 m (CW only)
Xiegu G90 (20 W) 160-10 m transceiver that works all modes
NI4L end-fed wire antenna