National Benthic Ecology Meeting and Film Festival Are Hosted by ODU

Old Dominion University is hosting the 41st annual Benthic Ecology Meeting, one of the largest scientific meetings for marine biologists in the United States, March 21-24. Mark Butler, ODU professor and eminent scholar of biological sciences, is the chair of the conference, which has attracted about 600 scientists and students to Norfolk.

Most of the meeting will be held at the Waterside Marriott Hotel on the downtown Norfolk waterfront, but there will also be an Under the Waves Film Festival held in conjunction with the meeting on Friday, March 23, at Nauticus maritime center.

Student attendees will visit science buildings and be served lunch at ODU on Saturday, March 24, and later that day all attendees will be invited to a dinner and dance at the Ted Constant Convocation Center.

The event will be held under the auspices of the Benthic Ecology Meeting Society.

Although the Under the Waves Film Festival will be open only to registered conference participants, some of the short films that have been entered in the festival competition will be shown to the public at the Naro Expanded Cinema on Colley Avenue in Norfolk at 7 p.m. on April 18. The screening will be free, and ODU scientists will be on hand to lead discussions about the films.

Butler said the ODU Marine Biology Student Association also intends to host screenings of some of the festival's short films on campus, but that the time and place has not yet been set.

More information about the meeting can be found at http://sci.odu.edu/bem/. More information about the film festival can be found at http://www.beneaththewavesfilmfest.org/.