Fragments of orange coral with white tentacles on small cement anchors in a tank.

Mesophotic coral can live at depths of 500 feet below the ocean surface. Even at this depth, some of the mesophotic corals in the Gulf of Mexico were affected by the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010. Our coral scientists supporting NOAA’s National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science are studying the extent of this impact.

Three of our employee owners participated in a mission to extract the corals from the Gulf of America (formerly Gulf of Mexico) that were then transported to laboratories in Galveston, Texas, Gainesville, Florida, and Charleston, South Carolina. Once the Charleston specimens were housed in custom-made tanks, our scientists began studying and caring for the corals. They feed the colony multiple times daily, and study their growth and reproduction. In an effort to restore the damaged coral colonies in the Gulf of Mexico, the team is studying how to maximize growth and outplanting at a larger scale.

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Supporting Guam’s Chemical Round Up

Senior chemist working on the CSS contract with the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Superfund Technical Assessment and Response Team (START) supported the Guam Lab Chemicals Round Up in March of 2024 and July of 2025. During both mobilizations, START supported EPA’s mission to collect chemical waste items from across the U.S. island territory of Guam for off-island transport and disposal. As a field chemist, CSS employee…

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New Award with University of Pittsburg 

CSS has recently acquired a new award working with the University of Pittsburg. As part of this work, a team of CSS employee owners has begun testing samples for Solidification Using a Baffle in Sealed Ampoules (SUBSA), a high temperature furnace with temperature and timing control for melting samples to create different materials and alloys.…

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CSS Employee Owners Receive NOS Team Member of the Year Awards  

Congratulations to two CSS Employee Owner who received a National Ocean Service (NOS) Team Member of the Year Award for their dedication and hard work over the past year.   One employee owner received an NOS Team Member of the Year Group Award as part of Team Lynker, the prime contract company with NOAA’s Office for…