Cindy L. Van Dover, associate professor of marine biology at the College of William & Mary, has been named director of the Duke University Marine Laboratory, effective Aug. 7, Duke University officials announced Wednesday.
Van Dover succeeds Michael K. Orbach, who will continue on the faculty at Duke's Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences as professor of the practice of marine affairs and policy, a position he has held concurrently with the marine lab directorship since 1993.
The Duke University Marine Lab is a unit of the Nicholas School. Located in Beaufort, N.C., the lab offers a year-round curriculum for undergraduate, master's and doctoral students as well as a full range of research, residential and teaching facilities. It addition, it serves as home port for the R/V Cape Hatteras and a fleet of smaller research and transport vessels.
The Marine Lab's resident faculty has expertise in oceanography, marine biology, ecology, physiology, biochemistry, cultural anthropology and marine policy.
This fall, the Marine Lab will open its newest building, the 5,600-square-foot Ocean Science Teaching Center, which is being built to the highest standards of energy and environmental efficiency adopted by the U.S. Green Building Council.
Van Dover, who specializes in the study of deep-sea hydrothermal vents and chemosynthetic communities, has received numerous honors for her research and teaching, including a Fulbright Research Scholarship in 2004, a National Science Foundation CAREER Award in 2000 and a William & Mary Alumni Fellowship Award for Outstanding Teaching in 2003.
In 2002, she was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She has served as a scientist or submersible pilot on more than 100 dives to the bottom of the deep sea.
"I am honored to have the opportunity to lead the Duke Marine Lab and to build upon the strong foundation provided by Mike Orbach in his years as director," Van Dover said.
"As a coastal facility within the Nicholas School, the Marine Lab is renowned for the strength of its research and its Ph.D. and professional graduate degree programs. It also is ideally situated for training undergraduates in marine conservation and science," she said.
Officials said Van Dover's selection, following a national search, comes at a critical time for the Marine Lab's development.
"These are exciting times at the Marine Lab," said William H. Schlesinger, dean of the Nicholas School and James B. Duke Professor of Biogeochemistry, to whom Van Dover will report. "Cindy Van Dover convinced all of us in the search process that she has a special combination of skills, scholarship and vision to lead the lab as it expands its mission and tackles new challenges and opportunities in the years to come."
Duke Provost Peter Lange, the university's chief academic officer, added, "I am confident that under Professor Van Dover's leadership, the Marine Lab will continue to evolve and grow as a world-class research and teaching campus."
Van Dover received a doctoral degree in biological oceanography in 1989 from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Joint Program. She received a master's degree in ecology in 1985 from the University of California at Los Angeles and a bachelor's degree in environmental science in 1977 from Rutgers University.
She has been on the faculty at the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Va., since 1998, and has taught or conducted research at numerous other top marine science institutions, including Woods Hole, the Oregon Institute of Marine Biology at the University of Oregon and the Institute of Marine Science at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks.
Her appointment as director of the Duke Marine Lab represents a homecoming of sorts: In 1994-95, she served as Mary Derrickson McCurdy Visiting Scholar at the lab and, in the late 1970s, she worked as a technician there after graduating from Rutgers.
"Through education and research, the Marine Lab contributes to the resolution of national and global issues in marine ecosystems," Van Dover said "It will be a privilege to work with the lab's faculty, Dean Schlesinger and the Duke administration to accomplish an ambitious agenda for the lab."