Oceans

The Santa Cruz Island Reserve is the largest NRS site and the biggest of the Channel Islands located off the Southern California coast. Research at Santa Cruz Island includes: Archaeology: Ongoing studies of the island’s prehistoric Native American cultures; the evolution of cultural complexity in hunter-gatherer societies, Terrestrial botany: Defense mechanisms of insular endemic plants; age structure in island chaparral communities; population genetics of endemic species, Terrestrial zoology: Reproduction and kinship studies for two endemic species: island jay and state-threatened island fox (Urocyon littoralis), Geology and geomorphology: Structure, diversity, and origin of the island’s geological formations; fluvial system responses; sediment transport in island watersheds, and Aquatic Biology: Population studies of kelpbed fishes and selected intertidal invertebrates.

Set in the Santa Lucia Mountains along the Big Sur coast, the Landels-Hill Big Creek Reserve encompasses several miles of rugged ridges, which flank the Pacific Ocean and descend to a rocky shoreline. Research at Landels-Hill includes: Prehistoric subsistence patterns and central coast archaeology, Long-term change in intertidal and subtidal communities, Biological diversity and ecology of Lepidoptera, including fire succession. Effects of European honey bee on native social bees. Ecology of speciation in Timema walking sticks, Marine fish populations within and adjacent to marine reserve. Baseline studies on genetics, behavior, and ecology of southern steelhead trout, and Landscape-scale modeling and surveying of plant-climate interactions. Deepcrustal geology of central California.

The Environmental Fluid Mechanics group at UC Berkeley uses numerical, observational, and theoretical tools to study the movement of water and air in the natural environment. Research interests include the coastal ocean and estuaries, the atmospheric boundary layer, sediment transport, land-atmosphere interactions, numerical methods, turbulence, effects of density stratification, contaminant transport, groundwater flow, biological fluid mechanics, and the intersections of these and other topics. Within each of these research areas, fundamental processes of fluid flows are investigated.

An international consortium of scholars that has played a major part in studies of ocean law since the 1970s, the Law of the Sea Institute (LOSI) was transferred to the Institute for Legal Research (ILR) in April 2002 and is administered by Professors Harry Scheiber and David Caron as co-chairs. LOSI has published a distinguished series of conference proceedings on a range of subjects dealing with ocean policy and the law of the sea with assistance from university, foundation, and governmental sponsors.

The Institute for Legal Research (ILR) is an Organized Research Unit of the University of California, Berkeley, established by the UC Regents in 1967. The Institute's mission is to serve as a center for interdisciplinary research, teaching, and public service. The ILR has initiatives in the program areas of environmental law and policy and ocean law and policy, as well as others.