Ocean Warming and Ecological Contaminants
Jennifer Thomson
Amina Schartup is a truly impressive woman. Assistant professor at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, previous researcher at Harvard, and studier of climate change-instigated fluctuations of ecological contaminants; she is now the author of a Nature article, linking ocean warming to higher levels of methylmercury in fish. This week, we interviewed her on her research activities, and her amazing journey all over the world to get to where she is now. Amina’s eloquent answers are full of captivating, personal experiences. Grab a cup of tea and have a read – you won’t be disappointed.
Hey Amina! Tell us a bit about yourself
I was born in Azerbaijan (USSR) to a Malian father and Russian mother, and have lived in Mauritania, Mali, and France before arriving to the U.S. in 2006 to start a PhD in Oceanography. I speak three languages fluently (Russian, French, and English is my third). I am a mother to an 11 year old boy and 8 year old girl, both of whom were born during my PhD. For fun, I do science!
What inspired you to study both oceanography and geochemistry?
Environmental issues were a constant throughout my childhood. In Baku (Azerbaijan), oil spills in the Caspian Sea were just part of life and the beach landscape. When my family relocated to Bamako (Mali) in 1994 to start a water well drilling company (my father is a geophysicist) we moved into an unfinished house in the outskirts of Bamako with no running water or electricity. I recall doing my homework by candlelight and fetching water from a city water “tap”. As the family business grew, we built our own “modern” house with solar panels for electricity and to power our brand-new water well. Our house became an attraction, and we ran hoses to our neighbours. After a few years we noticed dark deposits on our teeth. We later realized that the well water contained unsafe levels of iron, and hence went back to the city “tap”.
I stopped counting how many times I walked into an open sewer while strolling in Bamako (the fastest growing city in the world, with no centralized wastewater treatment facility - at least back then it didn’t). As far back as I can remember, I could see the impact humans have on their environment because in Western Africa (and former USSR) it was all left out in the open for us to literally step into. I was not fooled when I moved to Western Europe (France) by the developed world’s ability to “hide” our impact underground: in landfills away from city, or even export garbage to developing countries.
I studied chemistry in college and did an internship at a wastewater treatment R&D company (Degremont, Suez Environment). I loved every minute of the trial and error process of research. I loved working in this container-sized water treatment plant where temperature would reach 50°C. Heck I even loved the smell! This is when I realized that research was for me and signed up for a research MSc in Geochemistry and joined the aquatic geochemistry group under the supervision of Dr. Marc Benedetti. This was a fun and supportive group; I enjoyed our heated lunch discussions (with wine of course) and investigating how “Coca Cola” rivers in the Amazon transport carbon and trace metals. I was in Paris for maybe 4 years after receiving a few disparaging comments, from people outside my lab, such as “you don’t really think like a researcher”, various euphemisms of “you are not very bright”, despite my outstanding grades, and having never met a single faculty-member of colour I began to question whether a black woman could succeed as an academic in France.
I therefore decided to visit the U.S., and asked Marc and others from the group for contacts. I spent the summer of 2005 in Dr. Robert Mason’s lab (an oceanographer) and went on my very first research cruise in the Atlantic ocean. In the U.S., I met several faculty members of colour, who told me that: while it would be very difficult, my chosen profession was an option in the U.S. This is how I ended up joining Dr. Mason’s lab and became an oceanographer.
Your fieldwork is often conducted up north in the Arctic – what led you to become interested in the Arctic and the regulation of environmental contaminants specifically?
There are so many reasons for my interest in the Arctic, I am not sure where to begin!
Initially, I think it was circumstances and luck. As an international student, I didn’t have access to the well-funded grants / scholarships. I was a teaching assistant and wasn’t assigned to a specific research project with proper funding and access to research vessels (RV). I had to raise my own funding, use a small university RV, or piggyback on other people’s cruises. Having two kids didn’t help. I couldn’t go on the typical months-long oceanographic cruises, so I had to be creative and find ways to move science forward with very limited resources. When Dr. Sunderland from Harvard took on a project that would require working off fishing vessels on a sub-Arctic estuary, and with limited access to proper lab facilities, I was the perfect woman for the job. I packed my breast-pump, and trace metal clean Go-Flo bottle and went to the Arctic!
One of the boats I used in Bamako, Mali to collect Niger River samples in February 2018. Photo: Rebecca Stern
Once I got there, I realized how many overlaps there were with issues I grew up with in Africa. People highly dependent on a rapidly changing environment, working hard to preserve their culture and traditional foods in an era of globalization, issues of waste management, energy costs, food security, and so on.
It is also a way to keep a bit of a connection to my Russian side. I can’t wait to have an actual research project in the Russian Arctic, as most of the Arctic is Russian and relatively understudied.
Waiting for my ride in Northwest River, Canada. Photo: Prentiss Balcom. An Inukshuk (a manmade stone landmark used by Actic peoples) in Rigolet, Canada. Photo: Amina Schartup
I enjoy forming interdisciplinary connections. As a mixed-race child, I spent my life in the middle, in between cultures and people, so I have always been the “Other”. I guess, in a way, I embraced it by always trying to connect things that are typically not connected in both life and work. Working with contaminants allows me to connect chemistry to geosciences, to biology, to exposure, and even international policy.
All your research is done within the context of public health and how human-instigated chemical release affects human health itself. How important is it to have a human link to your ecological research, and do you feel this broad-ranging approach resonates more with policymakers when dealing with environmental issues?
I think that it is very difficult for people to connect with abstract environmental science issues, which is why the type of research I do may resonate more with the public and policymakers. It is a good exercise for all researchers to think about putting their work into the terms of everyday life. For example, everyone should be able to explain what they are doing to elementary school children. However, understanding how our planet works is important regardless of how directly the research can be connected to human health, or other tangible issues.
Could you describe your research and fieldwork concerning mercury in the oceans.
Three billion people rely on fish as an important and healthy source of protein. Human activity has greatly impacted not only the availability of fish, but also its nutritious value by releasing bioaccumulative toxins such as mercury. Societal costs of IQ deficits associated with methylmercury exposures have been estimated at ~ $16 billion in the US and EU alone. International efforts are underway to reduce human exposure to methylmercury by regulating anthropogenic mercury emissions. However, the biogeochemical links between mercury emission and its conversion to methylmercury and accumulation in fish are still poorly understood. Personally, I rely on field and experimental work to develop biogeochemical models and frameworks describing mercury chemistry in the oceans. I also study mercury’s conversion to the highly bioaccumulative and neurotoxic methylmercury, its accumulation in fish, and human exposure to this through fish consumption.
Setting up passive water samplers (white circles) on the River Niger. Photo: Amina Schartup
The models logo, designed by Amina Schartup
Tell us a bit about your latest research paper (published in Nature!) on ocean warming and the levels of methylmercury in fish
In the study, we developed a model of mercury accumulation in marine food webs. We showed that warming oceans and overfishing can have large impacts on the accumulation of toxic substances like methylmercury, the organic and most toxic form of mercury in the environment, in marine fish people like to eat. We illustrated this for the Gulf of Maine, which has been warming rapidly in recent years. Rising seawater temperatures are increasing the activity levels of cold-blooded fish, which then consume more food, and this results in more methylmercury uptake. We also showed that in some cases, overfishing can lead to increased methylmercury levels in fish. For example, if a predatory fish is consuming a prey that is low in mercury, but this prey is being overfished - forcing the predator to switch to another prey that is higher in methylmercury - we would see an increase in the predator’s methylmercury burden.
To read the full article – access it here
What have you noticed over time regarding the general levels of ecological contaminants in our warming oceans since you started your research, and what can we do to combat this?
I am actually worried about the environmental degradation in the developing world. I was hoping that, as environmental awareness grew, cleaner technologies would follow in time for the developing world to adapt to these better options. And we have done this before – for example, going from no mass communication, to mobiles leapfrogging landlines. Alas, this is not happening now with other technologies, and I am worried about what this means for the planet’s health. At the same time, having lived in difficult conditions as a child, I cannot in good conscience tell people that they shouldn’t aspire for a better quality and comfort of life because of the environment (sigh).
Your research is often in the press and media! Tell us about your science communication work. You often have to engage with many different groups of people – from governments to indigenous communities. How important is this diversity, and have you seen any changes in attitudes towards contaminants since starting research?
I think people like stories more than the results. As I work through research problems, I try to write down my thought process and the challenges I encountered. For difficult concepts, I spend some time thinking about ways to explain them using analogies and simple language. I fight the urge all scientists have: to want to explain every single technical detail, even when it’s crucial to the research question, because most people just don’t need to know it. For example, you can teach someone how to drive a car without getting into a long explanation of how an engine works.
Your newest position is currently at Scripps Institution of Oceanography – what is next for you there?
I am super excited to be back in an oceanographic institution with easy access to the ocean; there are so many things I want to do and so many amazing scientists I want to work with, I don’t even know where to start! So, I am trying to focus my efforts on setting up the lab and finishing some of my papers.
The Keeling Curve was born at Scripps. Photo: Amina Schartup
The ocean has changed rapidly in the last couple of decades. Could you leave us with any last words of wisdom concerning ocean conservation?
I am still in the process of gathering “wisdom”, but I would say that every time I go out to sea, I always end up thinking about what it means to be a human in the middle of the vast ocean. It is a very confusing moment: I feel both small / humble as an individual, but also powerful as a human. We are so small, and yet somehow, we have managed to control and affect so much around us. Surely, if we can influence the composition of the deep sea, we also have the ability to reverse some of our damage, and leave a clean world for future generations.
Huge thank you to Amina Schartup, for agreeing to take part in this interview! You can follow her at @amina_schartup // @Tamina38 and check out her amazing research profile here