HARBOR BRANCH - OFFICIAL PRESS RELEASE

HARBOR BRANCH ANNOUNCES $550,000 GIFT FROM LONGTIME SUPPORTERS

FT PIERCE, May 24 -- Longtime Harbor Branch supporters and Vero Beach residents Bill and Carol Barrows have made a cash donation of $50,000 and a planned gift of $500,000 to Harbor Branch to support its Marine Operations and Biomedical Marine Research programs.

"It's just a nifty place and I think that Harbor Branch is doing a whole lot of good in terms of oceanographic exploration," said Bill Barrows, former Vice President of International Operations at the Fusite Corp., an electrical parts manufacturer in Cincinnati now part of Emerson Electric Co.

The gifts will be used to support the operation of Harbor Branch's ships and deep-diving submersibles as well as ongoing research to discover marine organisms that produce chemical compounds with the potential to cure human diseases. One of the group's discoveries, called discodermolide, is currently in human clinical trials as a cancer treatment. Besides cancer, scientists are also exploring the potential of compounds discovered by Harbor Branch as treatments for other diseases such as Alzheimer's.

In honor of the couple's support, Harbor Branch will be naming one of its main workshops the "Barrows Marine Operations Building."

The Barrows first became involved with Harbor Branch while purchasing a pair of used generators off one of the institution's ships more than a decade ago to provide power on a small island in the Bahamas where the couple has a house. Through that experience the Barrows, who had held a lifelong interest in boats and marine ecology, became fascinated with the institution's work and began actively supporting it through the Harbor Branch Associates membership program.

"The Barrows have been great friends to Harbor Branch for years," said Dr. Shirley Pomponi, Harbor Branch's acting managing director, "and we greatly appreciate these recent gifts as well as all their past support."

For more information, please contact Mark Schrope at 772-216-0390 or schrope@hboi.edu.

HARBOR BRANCH Oceanographic Institution was founded in Ft. Pierce, Fla., in 1971 to support the exploration and conservation of the world's oceans. The institution has held to this mission and grown into one of the world's leading oceanographic institutions with a 500-acre campus, over 200 personnel, and a fleet of sophisticated research ships and submersibles.