FORKS — A talk about toxins in seafood is planned at the Olympic Natural Resources Center at 7 p.m. Monday.
Vera Trainer will speak on “Catching Crab and Digging Clams — What’s Going on with Toxins in our Seafood?” in the Hemlock Room at the center at 1455 S. Forks Ave.
The lecture is one in a series of Evening Talks at the center.
Refreshments will be served, and attendees can bring a dish to a potluck.
Trainer will discuss harmful algae blooms off the Pacific coast as well as an unusual “blob” of warm water estimated by scientists to be nearly 3 degrees above normal that extends from the Gulf of Alaska south to Baja Mexico.
She is the supervisory oceanographer for the marine biotoxin program at the Northwest Fisheries Science Center in Seattle.
Current research activities include refinement of analytical methods for both marine toxin and toxigenic species detection, assessment of environmental conditions that influence toxic bloom development and understanding shellfish susceptibility to toxins in their environment.
Trainer is president of the International Society for the Study of Harmful Algae and directs the North Pacific Marine Science Organization Harmful Algal Bloom International project.
She is the lead investigator of the Puget Sound Monitoring Program for harmful algal blooms and vibrio and a founder of the Olympic Region Harmful Algal Bloom partnership.
She received her doctorate in biochemistry and molecular biology at the University of Miami, with postgraduate studies in the pharmacology department at the University of Washington.
Evening Talks at the center are supported by the Rosmond Forestry Education Fund, an endowment that honors the contributions of Fred Rosmond and his family to forestry, education and the Forks community.
For more information, contact Frank Hanson at 360-374-4556 or fsh2@uw.edu.