Accessibility Navigation

  • Skip to Content
  • Skip to Navigation
Link to Smithsonian Institution homepage(link is external)
Login
Marine GEO logo

Main navigation

  • About Us
    • What We Do
    • Our Values
    • Who We Are
    • Guiding Documents
    • Opportunities
  • Our Network
    • Network Observatories
    • Collaborating
    • Join Us
  • Research
    • About Our Research
    • The MarineGEO Toolkit
    • Network Projects
    • Our Data
    • Publications
  • News & Events
  • Contact Us
  • Donate

User account menu

  • Log in

Breadcrumb

  1. Home
  2. Network Observatories

Upper Chesapeake Bay

Upper Chesapeake Bay

Salt marsh sampling
Fish seining
Fish trawling

Upper Chesapeake Bay,
Smithsonian Environmental Research Center

SERC’s 2,650-acre campus is a living laboratory for long-term ecosystem research on estuaries, shorelines, wetlands, forests, and farmland.

The Upper Chesapeake Bay MarineGEO site is based in Edgewater, Maryland at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC). SERC is a research institute of the Smithsonian Institution dedicated to environmental research and education at the land/sea interface. SERC is strategically located in a rural seascape close to the Baltimore-Washington DC-Annapolis urban system on the western shore of Chesapeake Bay and central to the Bay’s large watershed.  

Research and education at SERC address grand challenges in environmental science by working across ecological scales, conducting long-term studies, and engaging in comparative, synthetic studies. We value public engagement and have strong programs in citizen science, science education, and science communication. MarineGEO research at SERC is underpinned by over four decades of research on estuaries and adjoining watersheds, including time-series of benthic and mobile fish and invertebrate communities. Biodiversity collections aligned with the Chesapeake Bay Barcode Initiative support a comprehensive voucher collection and barcode library for taxonomic and genetic studies including environmental DNA. SERC is also home to the Global Change Research Wetland (GCReW) dedicated to in situ experiments designed to unravel biogeochemical processes in coastal wetlands responding to CO2 enrichment, warming, and other global changes, as well as a National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) site. Facilities include a wet lab suitable for tank and mesocosm studies, a fleet of vessels, and a wide variety of analytical instruments and computing resources to support research. MarineGEO research at the SERC focuses on salt marsh, oyster reef, sediment bottom, bay grass, course woody debris, and human-built (docks) habitats.

Participating Institutions

Smithsonian Environmental Research Center

People
Previous slide Next slide

Matthew B. Ogburn

Marine Ecologist

Smithsonian Environmental Research Center

Research Technician

Smithsonian Environmental Research Center
38.88558
-76.54129
user icon View more observations »

Observatories

Dauphin Island Alabama
San Francisco Bay
Hong Kong
Central Coast Peru
Meso-American Barrier Reef
Madeira Island, Portugal
Maria Island Marine Reserve
Gulf Coast Texas
Indian River Lagoon Florida
San Juan Islands
British Columbia
Upper Chesapeake Bay
Caribbean Panama
Follow Us
Facebook Twitter Flickr YouTube
  • About Us
    • What We Do
    • Our Values
    • Who We Are
    • Guiding Documents
    • Opportunities
  • Our Network
    • Network Observatories
    • Collaborating Organizations
    • Join Us
  • Our Research
    • About Our Research
    • Network Projects
    • Research in Action
    • Our Data
    • Publications
  • Resources
    • News & Media
  • Contact Us
Link to Smithsonian Institution homepage(link is external)
The Marine Global Earth Observatory (MarineGEO), directed by the Smithsonian’s Tennenbaum Marine Observatories Network (TMON), is a network of partners researching biodiversity as the heart of healthy, productive, coastal ecosystems, where marine life and people are concentrated and interact most. MarineGEO marshals the Smithsonian’s leadership in discovery and convening power to advance knowledge useful to decision-makers in supporting innovative management and protection of marine life.