4. PLAN LOGÍSTICA INTERNACIONAL
4.4 Cadena de Distribución Física Internacional de importación
I began my science journey on the island of Va’vau, in the kingdom of Tonga located in the South Pacific and not far from the international dateline . I had recently completed my service in the Royal Swedish Navy and I was contem- plating what to do with my life . My first step was to buy a round-the-world airline ticket to get the chance to experience other cultures and to see something else than pine trees, lakes, and the rolling hills that my native Sweden had to offer . I was also keen to experience a more pleasant climate . For some reason I was obsessed about the South Pacific and after several hours in the local library in my hometown reading all the available Lonely Planet guides for the area, I set my mind on Tonga . To say the least, it was a life changing decision . Many of my friends had chosen careers in civil engineering, and although this did not excite me, I was also heading in that direction . This changed when for the first time in my life I slipped into the warm waters of Tonga with a mask and snorkel on my face . I simply could not believe what I saw under the sea surface . Experiencing a healthy coral reef with myriads of corals and fish of all colours of the rainbow in real life was something out of the ordinary . None of the nature documentaries I had watched on TV had prepared me for the thrill I felt . I instantaneously realised that I wanted to study and work in the ocean .
Following six months on the road exploring Tonga, Fiji, Australia, and Bali, I returned to Sweden with about two dollars of combined assets in my wallet and bank account, but with a mindset to study marine science in a place where the average temperature significantly exceeded the annual average of 5-6 ºC experienced in my hometown in Sweden . With some hard work, a little bit of
luck, and a very generous student loan provided by the Swedish government, I eventually ended up at the Hawaii Pacific University on Oahu, Hawaii, USA to study marine biology . Nevertheless, due to a couple of inspiring teachers and
mentors in oceanography, Drs . Varis Grundmanis and Chris Winn, my area of
interest rapidly transitioned to the field of oceanography .
My first encounter with Fred Mackenzie took place in his corner office
overlooking Honolulu and the Pacific Ocean at the UH Manoa campus in the spring of 2001 . I had applied to graduate school at UH but my area of interest was highly uncertain, as I was pretty much interested in everything related to oceanography; my application letter covered everything from plate tectonics and seafloor mapping to chemical oceanography and climate change . Although this letter was against everybody’s advice for getting accepted to graduate school (it was rather a great recipe for rejection), this was a true reflection of my intellectual interests at the time .
My introduction to Fred was highly orchestrated by Chris Winn, my main
mentor at Hawaii Pacific University (I did not understand this until several years
later after I had started working with Fred), and my first research experience was
in Dr . Winn’s lab where I worked as a student research assistant for $8/hour for a
year . I am not exactly sure what went down before Fred admitted me (I had only
applied to the UH and my backup plan was to return to the South Pacific on a
surf safari), but I am convinced Chris Winn had a great deal to do with it . (As a
side note, Chris also had a lot to do with Fred meeting his lovely wife Judy as the
two of them met at Chris’ wedding) . Despite my broad and scattered scientific
interests, my grade point average and graduate record exam scores were quite OK apart from a B+ in microbiology and an embarrassingly low score on the verbal section of the GRE . However, I am still convinced that I earned an A in the microbiology class, but that this became a B+ after I and a group of fellow students managed to sink the microbiology professor’s dinghy in his pool during one of our graduation parties . This was to the delight of his teenage sons watching as I went down with the dinghy dressed in a brown polyester suit and beer in hand
(the beer was the last thing to go under) . During my first meeting with Fred, we
discussed my undergraduate honours thesis, and during my second visit to his office, he broke the news that he was willing to offer me a position as a graduate student . However, at the time I was not certain whether I had understood him correctly or not, and I spent several weeks becoming increasingly convinced that I must have misunderstood him until I received the admission letter in the mail . It was quite a relief!
My first year with Fred as a graduate student was interesting to say the least
and I got to take on roles that I had never imagined I would do as a graduate student in oceanography! It started out quite normal as I would imagine most students experience their first year in graduate school with mostly classes and
exams, and a little bit of research . Nevertheless, at the end of the year, Fred was
hosting and organising the Sixth International Symposium on the Geochemistry of the Earth’s Surface (GES-6) meeting at the University of Hawaii, which gathers the world’s top geochemists every four years . As the budget was limited, it fell
with every possible aspect of organising a conference . I started out editing and
helping Dr. May Ver put together the abstracts book; then I was the bartender
at the welcoming party at the Waikiki aquarium; then Dr. Michael Guidry and I
were in charge of the audio-visual at the actual conference (most people were using powerpoint presentations at this time, but the best talk was delivered by
Vaclav Smil; he had one overhead slide that he told me he may or may not show .
He ended up not showing it and gave a 40 minute fascinating science talk about nitrogen that had the audience totally enraptured); then we were responsible for the clean-up after the banquet at the Bishop museum, followed by taking on roles as tour guides and shuttle van drivers for a field trip on the “Big Island” of Hawaii! The latter was an adventure in itself . One of the activities included hiking to the active lava flows of the Kilauea volcano on the “Big Island” over rugged lava terrain for several miles (Fig . 2 .11) . Sixty extremely excited scientists scattered in every possible direction as we started the hike and it would have been easier to control a herd of sheep . At the end of the day, we had also managed to loose a few scientists and had to execute a search and rescue mission, which luckily had a happy ending . For a first year graduate student, it was quite a treat to be engaged in every possible aspect of the conference . I not only got the opportunity
Ph ot o c ou rt es y o f J ud y M ac ke nz ie .
Figure 2.11 The visit to the active lava flow on the “Big Island” of Hawaii, Hawaii, USA of participants at the Sixth International Symposium on the Geochemistry of
to meet all the big names in geochemistry and biogeochemistry, including Bob Berner, Dick Holland, Lee Kump, John Morse, Dick Feely, Abe Lerman, David Archer, and Vaclav Smil to name a few, but I also got a chance to interact with them in both formal and informal settings .
The first research project I started working on with Fred involved refining
the coastal compartment of TOTEM (Fig . 2 .12) . At the time, little attention had
been given to the role of the carbon cycle in the coastal ocean in the context of global environmental change despite the fact that this region is highly important at the global scale, as discussed in Section 9 .
Figure 2.12 The model TOTEM (Terrestrial Ocean aTmosphere Ecosystem Model) for the global carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus coupled biogeochemical cycles in the land-ocean-atmosphere-sediment system showing reservoirs, processes of transfer, and fluxes in 1012 mol per yearof the elements (after Ver et al.,
1999 as modified in Mackenzie et al., 2011).
Furthermore, the coastal ocean is heavily impacted by human activities, as nearly 40% of the global population lives within 100 km of the coastline (Cohen
et al ., 1997) . Our goal was to model how anthropogenic changes including rising
atmospheric CO2, temperature, and increasing material input via rivers and run-off
had altered global coastal ocean biogeochemical processes, including inorganic and organic carbon production . At the time some researchers had pointed out
state with respect to calcium carbonate minerals (i.e., ocean acidification, OA) that could have negative effects on marine organisms depositing shells and skeletons
of calcium carbonate including corals (e.g., Gattuso et al ., 1998; 1999; Kleypas et al .,
1999) . Nonetheless, at the coral reef symposium in Bali in the year 2000, a couple of abstracts appeared claiming that OA would not have a negative effect on coral reef organisms because the seawater pH would be rapidly buffered by dissolution of metastable carbonate minerals such as biogenic high Mg-calcite phases . The hypothesis was referred to as the Magnesian Salvation Theory (MST) . Hence,
Fred and I decided to use our model and evaluate quantitatively whether this
was true or not . The MST was proven incorrect (Section 10 .1), but this exercise marked the starting point for my research focus on ocean acidification, which is still my main research and teaching emphasis today .
During my PhD, Fred brought me along to the BBSR as a teaching assistant
for a summer class on coral reefs and climate change . There I met Nick Bates
(Fig . 2 .13) for the first time and we immediately started a fruitful collaboration investigating carbon chemistry and biogeochemical processes in a mangrove environment and in an environment called Devil’s Hole located within Harrington Sound, Bermuda . Once I had completed my PhD, it was a natural move for me
to continue my collaboration with Nick in Bermuda as a post-doctoral researcher
continuing the work on ocean acidification, but also exploring the problem of
the uptake and fate of CO2 in North Atlantic subtropical mode waters . As a side
note, it was Fred who introduced Nick to ocean carbon chemistry and the marine
carbon cycle when Nick participated in one of Fred’s summer courses in Bermuda .
Nick subsequently switched focus from being a geologist to the study of ocean
carbon chemistry . He has remained in this field of research ever since, including maintaining the inorganic carbon program of the Bermuda Atlantic Time-series
Station (BATS; e.g., Bates et al ., 2012) .
Ph ot o c ou rt es y o f J ud y M ac ke nz ie .
Figure 2.13 Fred, Nick, and Andreas gathered at a dock in Harrington Sound, Bermuda in 2010.
My science career almost ended in Bermuda since after a couple of years, I began to run out of funding, and being a 100% soft-money institution, no funding meant no job . Rather than heading back to the South Pacific on a surf safari, my backup plan this time involved moving to Margarita Island in Venezuela to pursue two passions of mine, kite surfing and salsa dancing, while learning to play the guitar and to speak Spanish . Two months before the implementation of my backup plan, I received my first NSF grant, and my career in science was saved . For the past several years, my research has focused on the effects of ocean acidification on coral reefs using Bermuda as a natural laboratory, which I hope to pursue for several more years . However, I am now an Assistant Professor at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California San Diego, California, USA, and I am developing a growing scientific interest for what is going on in my own backyard of the Pacific Ocean .
Working with Fred throughout my scientific career has been a tremendous
privilege and honour, not only is he an outstanding scientist, he is also the kindest and most generous person I ever met, and he has served as the ultimate role model in all aspects of my life (Fig . 2 .14) .
Figure 2.14 Fred and Andreas outside the Marine Science Building at the University of Hawaii after Andreas’ successful Ph.D dissertation defense in October 2006.
When Fred asked if I wanted to co-author this Perspectives article with him, I accepted without hesitation . Nevertheless, as the University of California at San Diego for some reason unknown to me strongly discourages its Assistant Professors to work with their previous Ph .D . or post-doctoral advisors if we want to get tenure, I may yet again have to resort to one of my backup plans in a few years . The road of life never stops being exciting and apparently it is never straight (Fig . 2 .15)! Co py rig ht : R ob in C ro ss m an | ht tp :// ne dan dl ar ryc om ic s. co m.