At the Center of Research in the Western Pacific
Guam’s coastal structures face a harsh reality: salt air and seawater corrode the steel bars inside concrete. Most construction materials, including cement and aggregates, must be shipped in from off-island, and the island continues to grapple with how to dispose of solid waste, including glass bottles.
The University of Guam’s (UOG) Guam National Science Foundation Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (Guam NSF EPSCoR) E-CORE (EPSCoR Collaborations for Optimizing Research Ecosystems) project has announced the recipients of its inaugural round of seed funding awards, providing nearly $200,000 in competitive research grants to UOG faculty.
Researchers, energy experts and community stakeholders gathered at the University of Guam recently to explore how the ocean surrounding the island could become part of Guam’s future energy portfolio.
UOG Associate Professor of Bioinformatics and E-RISE principal investigator Bastian Bentlage, Ph.D., set the tone for collaboration on Tuesday at the 17th University of Guam Conference on Island Sustainability as he opened the Guam NSF EPSCoR ECORE Research Grant Workshop, highlighting its discussion-driven format and calling on participants to actively exchange ideas, explore project concepts, and learn from one another.
Guam NSF EPSCoR’s Collaborations for Optimizing Research Ecosystems (ECORE) project is inviting proposals for its 2026–2027 Seed Funding Grant, offering $50,000 awards to support innovative, hypothesis-driven research across the island.
The University of Guam (UOG) has announced an extension of the 17th University of Guam Conference on Island Sustainability (CIS2026), expanding the event through April 26 with the addition of two days of programming in Saipan, further strengthening its partnership with Northern Marianas College (NMC).
The University of Guam is now accepting presentation proposals for its 17th Conference on Island Sustainability, scheduled to take place April 20-24, 2026, at the Hyatt Regency Guam.
A retired shell enthusiast recently donated thousands of shells to the Guam NSF EPSCoR Biorepository, many of which were collected on Guam during the 1960s, to be added to its historical collection.
In 2024, Guam NSF EPSCoR senior researcher Christopher Lobban, Ph.D., received an award from the Japanese Society of Diatomology for his paper “Disymmetria reticulata, gen. nov., sp. nov. (Mediophyceae: Thalassiosirales), a new genus in Lauderiaceae emend., and transfer of Lauderia excentrica.” Lobban, a UOG professor emeritus of biology, is the first non-Japanese member of the organization to receive an award.
In April 2025, the University of Guam welcomed visiting researchers as part of an ongoing collaboration on the development of a new research instrument that can be used to assess the bleaching risk of different types of coral.