Discovery of sound in the sea: Communicating underwater acoustics research to decision makers

Anthropogenic activities are subject to a wide range of environmental regulations. Decision makers must rapidly synthesize scientific research to properly assess potential impacts. To assist this need, the University of Rhode Island Graduate School of Oceanography teamed with Marine Acoustics, Inc. on the Discovery of Sound in the Sea (DOSITS) project to provide easily accessible, digital resources. The project’s foundation is a website (dosits.org) that summarizes peer-reviewed research on underwater sound. The site has over 475 content pages, thoroughly reviewed by scientific experts. A current focus is to develop resources for international decision-making community. Webinars include presentations by experts followed by interactive, real-time question and answer-sessions, which are archived on the DOSITS website. Webinars were conducted in 2015-2016, 2018, and 2019. The 2015-2016 webinar series focused on the fundamen-tals of the science of sound; the 2018 series focused on marine mammals and fishes. The 2019 webinar series focused on sound sources, including wind turbines, pile driving, seismics, shipping, echosounders, and military sonar systems. Additional resources for the international decision-making community include tutorials, instructional videos, and e-books on topics such as science of sound fundamentals, animal hearing sensitivities, and updates on potential effects of underwater sound on marine animals.