Three miles off the Alabama coastline lies a small barrier island called Dauphin Island. With fewer than 1,800 permanent residents and not much to do there other than fish and hang out on the beach, there might not be much reason for a scientist to travel the 45 minutes it takes to drive from Mobile - except that the island harbors three separate marine science facilities.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Alabama state government, and a consortium of Alabama colleges and universities each maintain a lab. The groups are on friendly terms and help each other out when they can, but the research focus differs at each facility, and they generally function as independent facilities.

Microbiology and chemistry lead the day at the FDA lab, where scientists do basic research with the aim of developing better detection and surveillance techniques.

For example, Merrill McPhearson, director of the FDA Gulf Coast Fisheries Laboratory, says that one of its ongoing projects is to develop a sensitive method for detecting Norwalk virus in shellfish. Although food poisoning from Norwalk is one of the most frequently occurring problems with seafood, McPhearson says that currently there isn't a sensitive method for detecting the virus. But by using a new polymerase chain reaction technique, McPhearson said, "I think we're on the verge of a breakthrough in this area."

The federal researchers are also working on the metabolism of the red tide neurotoxin in dinoflagellates and oysters. Red tides regularly close down shellfish beds to harvesting but, according to McPhearson, little research has been done on the metabolism of these toxins in either the dinoflagellates that produce the toxin or the shellfish that end up with it. Again, the goal of the research is to improve the methods of detection. Currently, "the standard method for measuring these neurotoxins is a mouse bioassay," said McPhearson. "We're trying to develop an analytical procedure that we can use to measure these compounds directly, but we need to know exactly which compound is of public health significance."

The academic laboratory, Dauphin Island Sea Lab (DISL), is by far the largest of the three facilities and, in contrast to the FDA lab, focuses on issues of ecology and water quality. The lab was originally established to provide teacher workshops and summer science programs for the participating colleges, but it has expanded far beyond that now, with two academic departments and ten full-time Ph.D. level faculty. "This lab differs from any other [marine laboratory] in that it started with an education mission and the research came on soon thereafter," said executive director George Crozier.

The science at DISL is very basic, says Crozier, and very diverse. For example, one faculty member, a paleoecologist, works on the long-term evolution of communities in Antarctica. He was also the first scientist to report the decline of the Belizian coral reefs a few years ago. Working closer to home are two biogeochemists: one who studies the role of sulfur-reducing bacteria in marshes, and one who is interested in nitrogen cycles in the shallow Mobile Bay that lies just to the north of Dauphin Island.

When the Australian spotted jellyfish invaded the Gulf of Mexico last year, researchers at DISL tried to figure out where they came from and why there was such an enormous bloom of the species. "It was sort of like the biblical plague of locusts," said Crozier. "They just cleared the water column" of anything edible because there were so many of them. DISL researchers surmised that once the spotted jellyfish got to warm Gulf waters they multiplied rapidly due to the heavy nutrient loading that's coming off the continental shelf.

Unlike the other two marine science labs on Dauphin Island, the state lab only does applied research. It is run by the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources and focuses solely on issues surrounding fisheries, monitoring the health of various marine fisheries through biological sampling.

Why this concentration of research facilities on an island that at its widest is just over a mile and is less than 14 miles long? Crozier says that the establishment of the labs was largely fortuitous, but "the longevity of all of the labs can be traced to the unique geography" of the island. To the north of Dauphin Island is Mobile Bay, which is the fourth largest estuary in the country. To the south is the Gulf of Mexico, and to the west is the Mississippi Sound.

Crozier observes that the region is in transition now and the rich estuary and marine waters are under increasing pressure. Historically, the region was typical of the Deep South's agrarian economy, but the county is currently undergoing a huge population growth, and the island is being built up with vacation properties. Also, Crozier, whose specialty is coastal zone management, points out that the coastline supports a substantial natural gas industry with a field second in size only to the North Slope of Alaska.

So though each lab functions on its own, the small island has become a powerhouse for marine science. Crozier and McPhearson admit that their opportunity for scientific interaction is limited because of their different emphases. As the largest of the facilities, DISL has become the hub of the group, holding seminars and housing a substantial library to which all three facilities contribute. Most years, one or two DISL graduate students do their research at the federal lab, and FDA faculty members have sat on graduate committees at the academic lab. So when all is said and done, Crozier and McPhearson agree that they're better off for having such interesting neighbors.