Valle-Levinson Returning to ODU for CCPO Seminar

Arnoldo Valle-Levinson, a University of Florida professor who formerly was on the Old Dominion University faculty, will present his latest research on fjord oceanography at a seminar of ODU's Center for Coastal Physical Oceanography (CCPO) on Monday, March 26.

The presentation, "Possible Adjustments to Two Paradigms in Fjord Oceanography," will begin at 3:30 p.m. in Room 3200 of Innovation Research Park Building 1 on ODU's east campus. The seminar and a reception with refreshments that begins at 3 p.m. are free and open to the public.

Valle-Levinson's recent experiments at Chilean fjords indicate that traditional ideas about net circulation being "two-layered" are not correct. Instead of the circulation simply involving outflow at the surface and inflow at depth, the semi-enclosed basins we call fjords have a three-layered circulation, his research shows. He also will present evidence that argues for a change in traditional ideas about the vertical migration of zooplankton (down at dusk and up at dawn) in the deep waters of fjords.

The guest speaker worked at CCPO prior to moving in 2005 to the University of Florida, where is a professor in the Civil and Coastal Engineering Department. His work focuses on estuarine and coastal hydrodynamics and on interdisciplinary studies of dissolved and suspended matter transport.