April 21, 2004 — On April 30, 2004, at 1000 Tokyo Time, DoD students in grades 4-8 in Japan, Korea and Okinawa schools will be participating for the first time in a 'live chat' with JASON Project host researcher Dr. Roland Kays via the web site, www.JASON.org . This year's JASON project is taking place in the rainforest of Panama . Dr. Kays is studying the ecology and movement of ocelots in Panama and is radio tracking ocelots to collect more data on their movement. He is specifically studying how interaction between the ocelots and their prey, the agoutis, affect tree regeneration.

Student questions about Dr. Kays' research on Barro Colorado Island will be submitted to a moderator who will select the questions to present to Dr. Kays. Kays will answer students' questions for a period of 45 minutes.

Schools will be setting up various arrangements to project the interactive 'live chat' to entire classrooms. Although these chats are usually conducted on Eastern Standard Time (EST), the April 30, 2004 , broadcast has been specially arranged for the DoDDS Pacific students by Ms. Faye Batey, Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA) JASON Coordinator.

The JASON project is an interdisciplinary curriculum/expedition that was conceived by Dr. Robert Ballard, discoverer of the Titanic, in an effort to share science and technology with students. This is the fifteenth year the JASON Project has been in existence.