Services

Facilities     –

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The section operates and supports specialized facilities for marine and terrestrial science, including the OIST Marine Science Station, Sea neXus, and the Plant Growth Facility.

OIST Marine Science Station (OMSS)

Built at the Seragaki Campus in 2016, the OIST Marine Science Station is a flow-through marine research facility supplied by seawater drawn from approximately 200 m offshore at a depth of 20 m. It supports experimental marine research and serves as a base of operations for marine fieldwork, diving, and coastal research activities.

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Sea neXus

Opened at the Seragaki Campus in November 2025, OIST Sea neXus is a new marine science facility designed to support advanced research, education, and collaboration. Building on the foundation of the OIST Marine Science Station, it features ten modular wet laboratories with flexible experimental setups, individual environmental controls, and access to flow-through or recirculating seawater systems.

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Plant Growth Facility

MTS is currently commissioning a Plant Growth Facility on OIST’s main campus to support controlled plant research. The facility will provide seven dedicated research rooms for plant experiments requiring controlled environmental conditions, careful sample handling, and contamination management.

Fieldwork | Technical Services | Collections     –

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MTS provides field and technical services to support marine and terrestrial research across Okinawa. This includes boating and scientific diving operations, environmental acoustic monitoring and analysis, and support for biological collections, sample collection, and field-based research logistics.

Diving & Boating

MTS supports marine fieldwork through boating and scientific diving operations, including planning and logistical support for coastal sampling, underwater surveys, specimen collection, and equipment deployment and retrieval. MTS also provides scientific diving training through an AAUS-recognized program, with diver training conducted under NAUI standards.

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© Cassondra George

Acoustics

MTS supports environmental acoustic monitoring, including field recording, long-term sensor deployment, underwater acoustic monitoring, and analysis of soundscape data. The section has experience with Kaleidoscope bioacoustics software, custom acoustic identification workflows, acoustic statistics processing, and visualization of biophony, anthrophony, and other soundscape metrics. These skills and resources have been used to support environmental acoustic recording across OKEON sites in Okinawa since 2017, with approximately 13,500 hours of recordings collected across multiple sites by 2025. MTS maintains these recordings, along with bird song detection models, acoustic identification workflows, and preliminary acoustic summary statistics. The section also has handheld field recorders for short-term recordings and deployable recording systems for longer-term monitoring, including underwater use.

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© Jake Lewis

Specimens & Collection

The OIST Insect Collection is a rich, diverse treasure trove of insects and other invertebrates collected from across Okinawa Prefecture. The collection primarily consists of material collected over the last decade (2015-present) in Malaise traps deployed at 24 sites across the OKEON field network. The dry collection contains approximately 240 drawers (~60,000 specimens) of mounted ants and beetles identified to the species level. The wet collection is largely unsorted and contains a diversity of insects and arthropods stored in high concentration ethanol and freezers to preserve DNA. The collection is ideal for a wide range of project types, including systematics, evolution, taxonomy, ecology, and genomic studies. MTS’s in-house collection is available for research along with expert consultation to aid you in your projects. We can also assist with insect identification (including dissections), z-stack micro imaging, and insect-specific preparations for X-ray micro-CT scanning. 

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Training & Safety

MTS supports safe research across marine and terrestrial environments through facility inductions, fieldwork and diving safety guidance, equipment training, first aid training, and coordination with OIST’s general safety training requirements. This helps ensure researchers are prepared to work safely in the field, in facilities, and around specialist equipment.

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Informatics - Data | Monitoring | OKEON     –

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MTS supports environmental research through long-term monitoring, data management, and informatics services. This includes maintaining field datasets, environmental sensor networks, specimen and acoustic records, camera trap data, and spatial data resources, as well as supporting mapping, data analysis, visualization, and data access for research across Okinawa’s marine and terrestrial environments.

© Kenneth L Dudley

Informatics & Data

At MTS we maintain datasets for the 24 OKEON field sites, specimen collections, acoustic recordings, weather stations, camera traps, and various other data. We can help with finding data, starting a project, or doing analysis. We also collect and have experience with GIS datasets such as satellite image analysis, soils, water features, land use & land cover, elevation & bathymetry, and watershed analysis. We can also help with cartographic and mapping tasks, or spatial analysis both in Okinawa and worldwide.

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Environmental Monitoring

MTS supports environmental research through long-term monitoring, data management, and informatics services. This includes maintaining field datasets, environmental sensor networks, specimen and acoustic records, camera trap data, and spatial data resources, as well as supporting mapping, data analysis, visualization, and data access for research across Okinawa’s marine and terrestrial environments.

OKEON Field Network

24 sites across OKINAWA since 2015

• OKEON Project
  

  Founded in 2015, the OKEON project at ESI consists of 24 long term monitoring sites covering a gradient between the agricultural and urbanized southern Okinawa to the forested north. Each site includes SLAM traps, acoustic recorders, camera traps, weather stations, and intermittent imaging data products. Sites cover an array of habitats including a mix between urban, urban fringe, agriculture, fields, small forest, protected forest, and coastal.

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• SLAM traps
  

  Three SLAM (Sea, Land, and Air Malaise) Traps (passive insect collection devices) are arrayed at each of the OKEON sites. A bottle of alcohol sits at the apex of the trap collecting insects that migrate upward and captures a wide variety of flying and crawling insects. Bottles are collected and replaced every two weeks, and specimens brought in and stored in alcohol and freezers. Only a fraction of the collected specimens have been sorted and identified, we are always looking for collaborators to seek out their favored groups and make use of this gigantic dataset. Previous projects have looked at the relationships between the seasonality of ants and land use and the confirmed of the first record of a weevil species in Okinawa.

  BugDorm SLAM Trap
• Acoustic Recorders
  

  All sites have a Wildlife Acoustics SM4 recorder on a 24 hour 1 minute on, 29 minutes off schedule. Our recorders can tell us about the noise environment at each site throughout the year, recording birdsong, frog calls, and insect noises among other sounds at high fidelity and gain. Previous projects have looked at the avifauna landscape of Okinawa, explored the habitat range of owls, call frequency of birds, faunal recovery in the acoustic landscape after a major typhoon and more...

  Song Meter SM4
• Camera Traps
  

  All sites have a wildlife monitoring Reconyx HF2X camera trap triggered on heat movement and generally capturing mammals such as boars, cats, dogs, rodents, and mongoose, along with the occasional avifauna. Equipped with infrared for nighttime images. When triggered the camera traps takes an image and records a short video. Projects have included researching the extent of the Okinawa wild boar, detecting invasive species, and using machine learning for species identification.

  Reconyx HF2X
• Weather Stations
  

  Weather stations deployed at each site feature modular HOBO H21-USB data logger with temperature, relative humidity, barometric pressure, insolation, soil temperature, soil wetness, and leaf wetness sensors. Stations are modular and can be augmented with additional sensors.

  HOBO H21-USB
• Imaging
  

  Intermittent imaging such as LiDAR scans with the TopoDrone LiDAR 200+, 360° pictures and video, environmental photography, wildlife photography, and canopy photos are carried out as needed for sites of interest. Potential projects include understanding the interplay of canopy cover and light on vegetation, scanning forest biomass changes over time, and enriching outreach experiences.

  TopoDrone LiDAR

Founded in 2015, the OKEON project at ESI consists of 24 long term monitoring sites covering a gradient between the agricultural and urbanized southern Okinawa to the forested north. Each site includes SLAM traps, acoustic recorders, camera traps, weather stations, and intermittent imaging data products. Sites cover an array of habitats including a mix between urban, urban fringe, agriculture, fields, small forest, protected forest, and coastal.

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Three SLAM (Sea, Land, and Air Malaise) Traps (passive insect collection devices) are arrayed at each of the OKEON sites. A bottle of alcohol sits at the apex of the trap collecting insects that migrate upward and captures a wide variety of flying and crawling insects. Bottles are collected and replaced every two weeks, and specimens brought in and stored in alcohol and freezers. Only a fraction of the collected specimens have been sorted and identified, we are always looking for collaborators to seek out their favored groups and make use of this gigantic dataset. Previous projects have looked at the relationships between the seasonality of ants and land use and the confirmed of the first record of a weevil species in Okinawa.

BugDorm SLAM Trap

All sites have a Wildlife Acoustics SM4 recorder on a 24 hour 1 minute on, 29 minutes off schedule. Our recorders can tell us about the noise environment at each site throughout the year, recording birdsong, frog calls, and insect noises among other sounds at high fidelity and gain. Previous projects have looked at the avifauna landscape of Okinawa, explored the habitat range of owls, call frequency of birds, faunal recovery in the acoustic landscape after a major typhoon and more...

Song Meter SM4

All sites have a wildlife monitoring Reconyx HF2X camera trap triggered on heat movement and generally capturing mammals such as boars, cats, dogs, rodents, and mongoose, along with the occasional avifauna. Equipped with infrared for nighttime images. When triggered the camera traps takes an image and records a short video. Projects have included researching the extent of the Okinawa wild boar, detecting invasive species, and using machine learning for species identification.

Reconyx HF2X

Weather stations deployed at each site feature modular HOBO H21-USB data logger with temperature, relative humidity, barometric pressure, insolation, soil temperature, soil wetness, and leaf wetness sensors. Stations are modular and can be augmented with additional sensors.

HOBO H21-USB

Intermittent imaging such as LiDAR scans with the TopoDrone LiDAR 200+, 360° pictures and video, environmental photography, wildlife photography, and canopy photos are carried out as needed for sites of interest. Potential projects include understanding the interplay of canopy cover and light on vegetation, scanning forest biomass changes over time, and enriching outreach experiences.

TopoDrone LiDAR

Research Coordination | Outreach     –

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The members of MTS have spent years maintaining relationships with the local community in Okinawa as well as stakeholders and government agencies to fulfill our roles in both research and education. We have developed multiple educational programs for young students as well as museum displays, community collaboration, and outreach programs. We can help connect you with the relevant parties to discuss field research, or other outreach you may wish to do. We can also aid in applying for research permissions, field sampling, and contracts.

© Credit: Kina Hayashi from Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology

Research Planning Consultation

The MTS team has experience supporting both laboratory experiments and field-based research across marine and terrestrial systems. We can assist researchers with experimental planning, practical study design, sampling strategies, fieldwork logistics, equipment needs, and facility requirements. By helping identify practical constraints early, MTS supports projects from initial planning through to successful implementation in the lab, field, or controlled experimental facilities.

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Permitting & Local Coordination

MTS supports researchers with permitting and local coordination for marine and terrestrial fieldwork. We help coordinate with fisheries cooperatives, villages, cities, Okinawa Prefectural Government, national agencies, and other local stakeholders to support responsible research activities. This includes assistance with permit applications, stakeholder communication, site access, fieldwork planning, specimen collection permissions, reporting requirements, and other procedures needed to conduct research in Okinawa.

Outreach & Public Engagement

Our team at MTS has had a meaningful impact on the local community through well received outreach and education programs. We have created education materials and classes for use in local schools, presentations for the community, museum displays, and tours and workshops at OIST to bring people and students in to see research and facilities. We have also jointly developed environmental education programs with resort hotels. We have developed workshops for adults and children for identification of problem ant species. We have good relationships with educators in Okinawa and can help you disseminate your research in the local community.

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