Dr. Larry Mayer is a Professor and first Director of the newly established School of Marine Science and Ocean Engineering at the University of New Hampshire. He is also the Director of the Center for Coastal and Ocean Mapping and the co-director of the NOAA/UNH Joint Hydrographic Center at the university. As an expert in the field of marine geology Dr. Mayer has served on, or chaired, a number of international panels and committees and has the requisite large number of publications on a variety of topics in marine geology and geophysics.
After being selected as an astronaut candidate finalist for NASA’s first class of mission specialists, Larry went on to a Post-Doc at the School of Oceanography at the University of Rhode Island where he worked on the early development of the Chirp Sonar and problems of deep-sea sediment transport and paleoceanography. In 1982, he became an Assistant Professor in the Department of Oceanography at Dalhousie University and, in 1991, moved to the University of New Brunswick to take up the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Industrial Research Chair in Ocean Mapping. In 2000, Larry became the founding director of the Center for Coastal and Ocean Mapping at the University of New Hampshire (UNH) and the co-director of the NOAA/UNH Joint Hydrographic Center.
Larry has participated in more than 90 cruises (over 70 months at sea!) during the last 37 years, and has been chief or co-chief scientist of numerous expeditions, including two legs of the Ocean Drilling Program and seven mapping expeditions in the ice-covered regions of the high Arctic. He has served on or chaired many international panels and committees and has a large number of publications on a variety of topics in marine geology and geophysics.
While earning his Ph.D from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in Marine Geophysics, Dr. Mayer worked with the Marine Physical Laboratory’s Deep-Tow Geophysical package, applying this sophisticated acoustic sensor to problems of deep-sea mapping and the history of climate. Dr. Larry Mayer’s present research involves sonar imaging and remote characterization of the seafloor as well as advanced applications of 3D visualization to ocean mapping problems and applications of mapping to Law of the Sea issues, particularly in the Arctic.
Most Recent Press:
Guinda Salsamendi, Xabier, Gracia, A., Puente, A., Juanes, J. A., Rzhanov, Yuri, and Mayer, Larry A., (In Press), Application of landscape mosaics for the biological quality assessment of subtidal macroalgae communities using the CFR index, Deep Sea Research. Journal Article
Mayer, Larry A., (In Press), The Continental Shelf and Changing Sea Level, Maritime Boundary Diplomacy, Center for Oceans Law and Policy Series, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers. Book Section
Mayer, Larry A., Roach, J. A., and Baker, B., (In Press), Deepwater Horizon and the Arctic: Is There a Need for International Regulation, Globalization and Law of the Sea, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers. Book Section
Trembanis, A. C., Duval, C., Beaudoin, Jonathan, Schmidt, Val E., Miller, D., and Mayer, Larry A., (In Press), A detailed seabed signature from Hurricane Sandy revealed in bedforms and scour, Geochemistry Geophysics Geosystems. Journal Article