Dr.
Picciolo (Tony) has worked for NOAA since Day One
in 1970. Currently he is the Marine Biology Group Leader at
the National Oceanographic Data center. Current primary emphasis
is in coral reef data management. In past years he developed
and managed NODC's biological program. He also served as Chief
of the NODC Oceanographic Data Applications branch, Chief
of the NODC Search and Acquisition Branch, Chief of the Oceanographic
Special Projects Branch and lengthy stints as Acting Division
Director for two NODC Divisions. He
developed and managed the NODC/NESDIS Liaison Officer Program
for more decades than he will admit. Another point of pride
is that he developed the international inventory of oceanographic
samples and observations, previously known by the acronym,
ROSCOP. He was the NODC Principal Investigator for data management
of the International Decade of Ocean Exploration (IDOE ) and
other major oceanographic programs. He served on several international
and national committees and working groups concerned with
oceanographic data management and was also the Executive Secretary
of the Scientific Committee for the Exploration of the Atlantic
Shelf (SEAS). Currently he is a member of two working groups
of the U.S. Coral Reef Task force.
Tony
earned his B.S. and Ph.D. degrees in zoology at the University
of Maryland. His first introduction to marine biology was
as a graduate student, where with his professor, Dr. Howard
E. Winn, he spent two summers at the Bermuda Biological Station
working on the behavior, autecology, and bioacoustics of coral
reef fishes. He
also studied ichthyology under Drs. Leonard P. Schultz and
Earnest Lachner at the Division of Fishes, U.S. Museum of
Natural History. He spent two other summers working for the
Division of Fishes (Indopacific fishes) and the Systematics
Laboratory of the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries (which under
NOAA became the National Marine Fisheries Service.) During
these years he also worked on reproductive biology and behavior
of southeast Asian fishes, bioacoustics and behavior of Chesapeake
Bay fishes, behavior and ecology of freshwater stream fishes,
and the developmental anatomy of tropical marine fishes.
Over the years he has spent a lot of time in personal exploration
and specimen collection in the Peruvian and Colombian Amazon
regions, the Angel Falls area of the Gran Sabana of Venezuela,
the Sierra Maestra Mountains of Cuba, the volcanic slopes
of Guadeloupe and St. Vincent, and Trinidad and Tobago. As
a scuba diver, he has dived and photographed reefs in the
Florida Keys, Guadeloupe, the Cayman Islands, Turks and Caicos,
the Dominican Republic, Cozumel, Dominica, St. Lucia, the
Bay Islands of Honduras, and Belize.
Tony
has also held teaching positions at the University of Maryland,
Prince George's Community College and the U.S. Department
of Agriculture Graduate School. He taught courses in general
biology, general zoology, vertebrate anatomy and physiology,
human ecology, vertebrate embryology, and advanced biological
oceanography.
Tony's interest in biology emerged early in his life, probably
as a natural extension of an early passionate interest, which
continues to this day, in 19th century central and south African
history . Given any opportunity, he will bore you to death
with mind-numbing minutia on the exploits of Victorian-era
African explorers, the rise and fall of the Zulu nation, and
why Western civilization is crumbling as a result of three
world catastrophes: The Loss of the Brooklyn Dodgers and the
deaths of Elvis and Francis Albert Sinatra.
Tony lives with his fellow Scuba diver and photographer wife,
Sherry, and 10 year old son, Brad, (and a miserable boxer
named Tracker) in the Tantallon area of Fort Washington, MD.
Sherry is a foreign language teacher at the Hensen Valley
Montessori School. Tony has two older sons, Mike, a Ph.D.
candidate in EE, working at NRL, and Nino, a computer scientist
in San Ramon, CA.
