Senior Research Associate I

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The Cooperative Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Studies (CIMAS) at the University of Miami, Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science has an exicitng full time opportunity for a Sr. Research Associate I. The position is situated at the NOAA Southeast Fisheries Science Center (SEFSC) Marine Mammal and Turtle Division located in Miami, FL.  The research includes conducting passive acoustic studies of the distribution, occurrence, movements, and density of marine mammals and anthropogenic noise sources in waters of the Gulf of Mexico, the North Atlantic, and the Caribbean. This research will improve our understanding of marine mammal ecology and evaluation of restoration projects to address the injury to marine mammal populations that occurred from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.  Research will involve close collaboration with scientists from the NOAA Fisheries Southeast Fisheries Science Center (SEFSC) and with scientists at institutions including Scripps Institution of Oceanography, Universidad Veracruzana, and Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico.

POSITION DESCRIPTION

The incumbent will utilize a solid foundation in acoustic analysis techniques to support core missions of the SEFSC Marine Mammal Branch.  Beneficial experience can include work in noise estimation, acoustic filtering, and AIS vessel data processing. Experience developing and evaluating automated bioacoustic signal detectors and classifiers and working with large multi-year acoustic and AIS datasets is preferred.  Programming experience is essential; experience programming in Matlab and R is preferred.

The project will include project management and analytical work for passive acoustic data collected from research surveys focused on marine mammal ecology.  Analytical work will include detecting and classifying marine mammal calls and noise signals in acoustic recordings, characterizing seasonal variability in occurrence and distribution of marine mammals and noise sources, and associating AIS-based vessel traffic data with acoustic recordings, and technical writing to disseminate project results.  Project management will include handling fieldwork and meeting logistics, leading workshops and webinars, communicating with project team members and stakeholders, and writing reports. The project may involve both analytical and fieldwork.  The working location will be at the SEFSC laboratory in Miami, FL.

SUPERVISION RECEIVED

The incumbent will work with minimal daily supervisory oversight but will periodically report to other CIMAS and SEFSC staff to ensure project commitments are achieved and will be under the general supervision of the Director of CIMAS. The incumbent is expected to report periodically to the Director of CIMAS and their SEFSC advisor on work progress, and will derive technical guidance regarding his/her work through interactions with SEFSC and CIMAS staff.

SPECIFIC DUTIES

• Develop, implement and evaluate manual and automated methods to detect and classify biological and anthropogenic sound sources in long-term acoustic monitoring recordings, including identifying calls of acoustically known and unknown marine mammal species.
• Evaluate detector performance, including false alarm and missed call rates
• Characterize and compare spatiotemporal occurrence and variability in marine mammal call detections and anthropogenic and natural noise sources
• Perform soundscape characterization analyses, including evaluating ambient noise as the statistical distributions of sound pressure spectrum levels and identifying the main physical, biological, and anthropogenic components of the soundscape to better understand the noise contribution from sources such as shipping and seismic surveys
• Manage and analyze AIS vessel traffic data and associate it with acoustic recordings to improve understanding of shipping and seismic survey noise sources
• Manage and analyze large datasets efficiently, including QA/QC and archiving raw data and analytical results from passive acoustic moorings
• Perform project management including handling field work logistics, leading workshops and webinars, communicating with project team members and stakeholders, and writing reports
• Use various software applications to assemble, manipulate, and