A Message From the Director

I love it when people ask what we do at the Whitney Laboratory for Marine Bioscience. They’re usually astounded when I tell them how much we can learn about ourselves by studying simple sea creatures. Lobsters, sea slugs, horseshoe crabs and even the lowly jellyfish can teach us a great deal about our own biology.

Since its founding in 1974, the Whitney Laboratory for Marine Bioscience, a research institute of the University of Florida, has earned international acclaim for marine biomedical research in important fields such as vision, sense of smell, neurobiology, parasitology, developmental and vector biology. We are now embarking on an exciting new academic venture that will complement and enhance our existing expertise.

Marine animals, be they wild or in captivity, are increasingly vulnerable to disease. We can witness this through the many strandings of marine mammals and from the increasing burden and costs that disease places on marine farming. To address this growing problem, the Whitney Laboratory is seeking to create The Center for Marine Animal Health. This will be a marine veterinary school that will conduct research into the biology of marine animals and their diseases, develop diagnostics and treatments for those diseases, and train veterinarians and technicians to apply those treatments. The University of Florida’s College of Veterinary Medicine and others around the world can treat most diseases of domestic pets and farm animals. The goal of The Center for Marine Animal Health is to afford marine animals the same level of care.

This program will build on the existing strengths of the Whitney Laboratory in the cell and molecular biology of marine animals, and will gain the credibility needed for good marketing from our reputation in this area. At the same time, the marine animal health program will highlight the importance of our existing marine biomedical programs and give them a very public face — a win-win situation.

I invite you to join us in the campaign to create The Center for Marine Animal Health and to help make Florida Tomorrow a place where marine animals can live disease free.

Sincerely,

Peter Anderson, director
Whitney Laboratory for Marine Bioscience