There’s a mass migration under way to Portland, Oregon! Can you feel it?

This week, thousands of ocean and coastal scientists from around the world are gathering there for the 2018 Ocean Sciences Meeting. Ocean Conservancy’s Anna Zivian (@azivian), Henry Huntington, Todd Stevenson, Nick Mallos (@NickMallos) and I (@CO2ley) will be among the many eager science-types flocking there with poster tubes and laptops, ready to share results and learn from others.

Part reunion, part summer camp, and part graduate seminar, this year’s meeting will focus on a number of themes we’re especially excited about. Naturally, I’m eager to see as many of the 164 ocean acidification talks and posters as I can. I’m giving a talk on how we incorporate new issues like ocean acidification into the existing web of ocean policies. Anna will be giving a talk on the RAY Conservation Diversity Fellowship and Henry will be giving a talk on how fisheries management in the Arctic can incorporate precautionary principles. In addition to the thousands of talks and posters for us to choose from, there are also over 150 town halls where specific issues will be discussed in depth. I’m participating in an early career town hall, where I’ll be talking about non-university career paths. Additionally, Anna is leading a town hall that will consider how ocean research can be better integrated to result in more sustainable human behavior. If all that wasn’t enough to keep us plenty busy, there will be hundreds of colleagues we’ll bump into and want to catch up with.

No matter how many activities we participate in this week, there’ll always be just that one more we wish we could have seen. Fortunately, we can also learn about some of the discussions and themes we couldn’t fit in by following the active Twitter feed around the meeting at #OSM18. Follow this tag, our Twitter feeds and Ocean Conservancy (@OurOcean) to learn more!