We are pleased to announce that Dr. Louise McGarry, one of Echoview’s Hydroacoustic Specialists, has been awarded Best Paper by the Journal of Marine Science and Engineering (JMSE) for her contribution as a co-author on the paper, "Measuring Detection Efficiency of High-Residency Acoustic Signals for Estimating Probability of Fish–Turbine Encounter in a Fast-Flowing Tidal Passage." The paper was published in a JMSE Special Issue: Interface Between Offshore Renewable Energy and the Environment.
The JMSE Best Paper Award is an annual accolade that highlights publications of outstanding quality, scientific significance, and extensive influence. Each year, an evaluation committee reviews and selects four exceptional articles released in the journal over the previous year. The Best Paper Award looks at the scientific merit and impact, focusing on the originality of the research objectives and the ideas presented, and the creativity of the study design or uniqueness of the approaches and concepts.
Collaborating with lead author Dr. Brian Sanderson and co-authors Drs. Charles Bangley and Daniel Hasselman, the research team reports the results of a field experiment undertaken to quantify and evaluate the detection efficiency of two signal types encoded into acoustic tags deployed at a tidal energy demonstration site. The quantification of acoustic efficiency and the subsequent effective detection area of an acoustic telemetry system is the crucial first step for assessing the potential risk to fish posed by the deployment of marine hydrokinetic turbines into the habitat.
Their research provides valuable insights into the technology and analytical methods required for this work in a physically and acoustically challenging environment where the bathymetry is highly variable and tidal flow rates can exceed 5 ms-1. The ultimate goal of the work is to quantify the probability that a fish belonging to some local population will encounter a marine hydrokinetic turbine.
The important contribution of the paper is the articulation of a methodology from which an upper limit on the probability that an individual fish belonging to the population of interest may be harmed by a marine hydrokinetic turbine: an important step toward objective regulation of the tidal energy sector and fisheries.
Congratulations to all authors on this achievement.
About Louise
Louise has extensive experience at the interface between Marine Renewable Energy and marine ecosystems. Prior to joining Echoview in 2023, Louise served as lead hydroacoustic scientist at two tidal energy sites in eastern North America. She served as Canadian representative to Ocean Energy Systems (OES)-Environmental, an international, intergovernmental collaboration which works to mobilize information and practitioners from OES nations to coordinate research that can progress marine energy in an environmentally responsible way. She has served as Peer Reviewer for the Marine Energy Program of the US Department of Energy (DOE) Water Power Technologies Office (WPTO). Louise was also a co-author and lead hydroacoustician on a peer-reviewed journal article describing a machine-learning model, Echofilter, developed to improve the automation, standardization, and timeliness for post-processing echosounder data collected at a tidal energy demonstration site.
