Qué Pasa, OSU? - go to site

Into the OceanCaring for Marine Life Leads Michael Flores to Octopus Intelligence ResearchBy Yolanda Zepeda, Office of Diversity and InclusionPHOTO PROVIDED BY MICHAEL FLORESAre you smarter than an octopus?Michael Flores spent a summer finding out.A fourth-year student majoring in marinescience in the School of Environment andNatural Resources—Fisheries Science,Michael spent the summer of 2011 on thebeach in South Padre Island, Texas. Hewasn’t playing volleyball or working on histan. Michael was building complex mazesand training a veined Indonesian octopusnamed JD in a series of puzzles and gamesdesigned to test octopus intelligence.Michael interned at the South PadreIsland Dolphin Research and Sea lifeNature Center, a non-profit organizationdedicated to educating the public aboutthe bottlenose dolphins native to the Gulfof Mexico. The Center features marineanimals native to the area including livefish, starfish, crabs, octopus, and snails.Originally an unpaid intern at the Center,Michael fed and cared for the animals. “I’vealways loved the ocean,” he says, “and Ihave always known that I wanted to spendmy life doing something related to marinelife.”For his octopus intelligence research,Michael ordered two small, Indonesianveined octopi after unsuccessful attemptsto trap local specimens. As it turned out,they were small and not well suited forthe mazes. Then one day a child snaggeda three-foot veined octopus while fishing.Michael retrieved it and named him JD.Soon he and JD would begin a dailyregimen that included feeding, hoursworking with puzzles and mazes, andsharing an evening of television at theCenter. Michael laughs as he recalls howJD warmed up to him over time, movingacross the tank to be nearer to Michael asthey viewed their favorite shows, “JD wasgreat, he even climbed out of his tank andsat on the top, kicking back and watchingTV with me.”JD’s intelligence tests involved beingplaced into a six-foot maze made ofmovable, silicon walls, with a live crab“prize” at the end of the maze. The trialsdemanded learning on both JD’s andon Michael’s part. For instance, in earlydesigns, the crab climbed out of the box atthe end of the maze and approached theoctopus, essentially helping JD to solve thepuzzle and speeding up his own demise.Michael adapted the design to contain thecrab, but then JD learned how to grasp andpull down the walls, destroying the mazeto get his prize. “Over the weeks, I builtmazes, and JD destroyed them. He is smartand surprisingly strong.”Caring for JD and the other marine lifeat the Center didn’t involve merely shakinga can of Tetra over their tanks. Since theoctopus refused anything but live food,Michael began and ended his days wadingwaist-deep in the gulf to catch small fish,shrimp, and crabs. He describes beingsomewhat unnerved “as I stood there inthe evenings with the sun going down, inwater up to my waist, as I watched the finsof the blacktip sharks that were commonto the area glide back and forth in thedistance. It was eerie.”He also collected other memorableexperiences like the birth of sea horses.“We had been watching our seahorse fordays waiting for it to give birth,” Michaelrecalls. “One day, we noticed that the waterwas really cloudy, so my assistant turnedup the filter pump. The water wasn’tgetting clearer and when we investigated,we noticed that the seahorse had givenbirth. Unfortunately, many of the fry werestuck to the filter!” Michael describes howhe and his assistant spent the better partof that day painstakingly removing thetiny, newborn seahorses from the tank filterwith a pair of tweezers.Eventually, Michael’s unpaid internshipled to a paid position as manager of theCenter, carrying with it responsibility formaintenance of the Center and care of themarine life. With room and board providedby the Center’s director, the internshipproved not only intellectually enriching butfinancially rewarding as well. Michael alsotook advantage of the chance to refreshhis Spanish language skills weakened fromfour years of disuse in Ohio, as he pledgedto speak only Spanish with his assistantwho spoke little English. The assistant waspatient with Michael’s rusty Spanish, as hehimself struggled with his own pledge tospeak only English.Reflecting on his summer at PadreIsland, Michael talks about it being oneof the best experiences ever. When hereturned to Columbus at the end of thesummer, he continued to engage inresearch as a research assistant with theOSU Fresh Water Mussel Facility. With oneyear of school remaining, Michael is excitedto begin a career in marine science and hasno doubts about achieving his dream. Buthis academic journey has not been withoutchallenges.As a high school student in San Juan,Texas, Michael didn’t aspire to attendcollege. Although he was an honorsstudent and had completed a number ofcollege courses in high school, Michaeladmits, “I never really believed that acollege education was for me. I was justgoing to graduate from school and get ajob.” His high school counselor recognizedMichael’s talent, prompting him to applyfor college admission. Under the Texas TopTen Percent plan, Michael was admitted toany state college of his choice, and receivedfull scholarship offers from several schoolsincluding the University of Texas.Enter Maria Sanchez, academic coordinatorfrom Ohio State University’s Office ofMinority Affairs (now the Office of Diversityand Inclusion). Maria visited Michael’shigh school, and her enthusiasm about theofferings of Ohio State was persuasive. Ascholarship offer sealed the deal. The onlyobstacle standing between Michael andhis Buckeye adventure was his family. Like20