[3] Silver is best known for her research into marine snow, particles that are biological hotspots of activity in the water column and transfer organic matter to the deep ocean.
[6] When their preliminary analysis revealed the particles were concentrated in nutrients, she got $5000 from an administrator to continue the work[6] which led to a seminal publication with Shanks and Trent about marine snow that was published in Science[7] and a follow up paper in Limnology & Oceanography which quantified the increased levels of phytoplankton pigments on marine snow particles.
[8] In a 2019 interview, one of the undergraduates, Jonathan Trent, describes how Mary Silver introduced him to plankton and his early experiences with blue water diving to collect samples.
A cook calls a stray cat and feeds it a tiny bit of suspect food; if the cat is doing fine in an hour or two, the food is safe to cookSilver set the stage for women conducting research in the field which she describes in a 2005 article in Oceanography[5] that she wrote upon the occasion of receiving the Mary Sears Award from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.
"[16] In 2009, The Oceanography Society named her a fellow "For pioneering research on the ecology of marine organisms, excellence in teaching, mentoring and service to the oceanographic community".