NOVA SOUTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY, INC.

Coral reef ecosystems throughout the world are extremely valuable biologically, environmentally, and economically. Florida coral reefs represent the largest area of coral reefs in the United States, contributing more than $6 billion in income and 71,000 jobs annually in South Florida alone. These exquisite living natural resources have been in existence for over 215 million years. They provide employment, food, recreation, biodiversity, habitat, chemicals for human health, and coastal protection. Millions of tourists and residents enjoy SCUBA diving, snorkeling, and fishing on coral reefs -- activities that provide substantial income for coastal communities and inland. Unfortunately, reefs of Florida, the nation, and world-wide are under extreme threat from both global and local stressors. Research is urgently needed for improved understanding, management, and conservation. Nova Southeastern University has established and will construct the Center of Excellence for Coral Reef Ecosystems Science (CoE CRES) Research Facility. The activities in the multi-disciplinary research building are to address national and international priorities in coral reef research in five thematic areas: 1) Impacts of global and local stressors; 2) Geospatial analysis and mapping; 3) Deep sea coral reefs and biodiversity; 4) Genetic and genomic connectivity; and 5) Hydrodynamics. The CoE CRES will include space for offices, laboratories, collaboration, research training, and fieldwork staging. It's designed to promote high quality and impactful research by current and new faculty, researchers, visiting scientists, post-doctoral fellows, and graduate students. The 86,000-sqare-foot CoE is to be located at Nova's Oceanographic Center and its National Coral Reef Institute (NCRI) on the ocean side of Port Everglades in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. Funded in part by a grant from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) at a cost of over $30 million, the research facility is expected to create 22 new academic jobs and 300 construction jobs; employ 50 graduate students; and preserve 22 existing academic jobs. the CoE CRES will be the only research facility in the nation dedicated entirely to coral reef ecosystem science. Major goals include not only fundamental research, but also to finding management and conservation solutions to pressing coral reef issues. Completion is scheduled by 2012. As one of NOAA's external Coral Reef Institute partners, NCRI has long supported NOAA's mission by providing outstanding scientific research to support federal, state and local management and conservation in providing local, regional, national, and international research products that can offer solutions to the coral reef crisis. The new CoE CRES provides both urgently needed state-of-the-art research facilities and consequently expanded scientific capacity.

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