The Open Ocean Trustees are pleased to announce a public webinar on Tuesday, July 14, 2026, which will share updates of restoration efforts underway through the Mesophotic and Deep Benthic Communities (MDBC) projects in the Gulf of America.
The MDBC restoration team will provide updates from the four MDBC projects, which are led by the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the Department of the Interior to restore mesophotic and deep-sea communities that were injured by the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
The projects began a 5-year implementation phase in 2022 and include a robust portfolio of field and lab work. In 2025, the MDBC team and partners spent almost 200 days at sea across more than a dozen expeditions, during which they collected critical data to characterize and understand these complex habitats, support resource management activities, test restoration techniques, and set the stage for continued restoration in 2026. Now, the projects are scaling up efforts to synthesize all the data collected in the field and labs to share the results from five years of implementation and to inform continued restoration efforts.
The webinar will begin at 11:00 a.m. CT. During the webinar, we will share updates from the 2025 field season, discuss ongoing restoration for 2026, and present how experts will be synthesizing data and samples to refine and implement effective restoration strategies for the Gulf. Following these presentations, there will be an opportunity for questions.
The webinar is open to everyone, and we encourage your attendance and participation.
- Date: Tuesday, July 14, 2026
- Time: 11:00 – 12:30 p.m. CT (12:00 noon - 1:30 p.m. ET)
- Please register for the webinar at: https://uri-edu.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_664r0YQnSeeHSdqMXGQ7wg#/registration
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email with information on how to join. Following the webinar, we will post the webinar presentation slides and a recording on the Gulf Spill Restoration website, available through the Open Ocean Restoration Area page. All webinar materials will be available for the public.
See more information about the four MDBC projects:
- Habitat Assessment and Evaluation Project
- Active Management and Protection Project
- Mapping, Ground-truthing, and Predictive Habitat Modeling Project
- Coral Propagation Technique Development Project
Please contact us at gulfspill.restoration@noaa.gov by June 30 if you need accommodations for audio or visual accessibility. The University of Rhode Island Inner Space Center is providing technical support for the webinar.
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