New England Aquarium Day 3: Aquarium Medical Center
Today I will be working in the Aquarium Medical Center. After a morning meeting, Charlie Innis who is the Director of Animal Health showed me around the area they work. We went up to necropsy and I was able to ask questions about procedures with different animals and he explained the medical side of an aquarium which I was much more unfamiliar with. I appreciated him explaining things to me, and now I have a better understanding of what they would do if an emergency situation arises. He showed me some of the labs where scientists are doing research. One in particular is trying to find a better way to get samples of hormones from animals without doing it through a blood or a urine sample. This is very hard to get on a large animal, like a whale. So they are finding ways to collect it through feces floating in the water, or even spray from a whale. I asked and he said that some scientists are trying to use drones to collect this spray, which I found very interesting. We discussed medicine as well. There isn’t a big market for medicine for animals that aren’t domesticated so they have to use estimations or compare to previous animals on how much medicine to give. I then got to talk with Nina Nahvi, who is the Aquarium Medical Center Manager. It was great to pick her brain about different career paths within marine science. They had a lot of work and meetings to do so Mike O’neill, from the Giant Ocean Tank, showed me around his department and explained how the dive in the Giant Ocean Tank would go on Friday. Ended the day early and was able to get some good rest as I will be working in Marine Mammals department tomorrow!
