Photos From The Guardian: Indian Ocean Vent Critters
Indian Ocean Video Link
British scientists have found a remarkable array of creatures, some of them new to science, in one of the most inhospitable regions of the deep sea. In the first ever expedition to explore and take samples from the "Dragon Vent" in the south-west Indian Ocean, remotely operated submarines spotted yeti crabs, sea cucumbers and snails living around the boiling column of mineral-rich water that spews out of the seafloor.
Dr Jon Copley, a marine biologist at the University of Southampton who led the exploration of the Dragon Vent, said his team found animals that had not been seen in neighbouring parts of the oceans.
"We found a new type of yeti crab. Yeti crabs are known at vents in the eastern Pacific and there are two species described so far, but they have very long, hairy arms – ours have short arms and their undersides are covered in bristles. They're quite different to the ones that are known from the Pacific," said Copley. "This is the first time a Yeti crab has been seen in the Indian Ocean."
His team also found sea cucumbers, vent shrimps and scaly-foot snails. Sea cucumbers have previously only been seen at deep sea vents in the eastern Pacific. "This is the first time they've been seen at vents in the Indian Ocean and they're not known from the central Indian or mid-Atlantic vents so far," he said.
Deep-sea vents, also known as hydrothermal vents, are springs of superheated water that are powered by underwater volcanoes. They erupt from the sea bed and are usually found a few miles under the sea surface. The scalding temperatures and rich mineral content of the water give rise to vast rocky chimneys, which have been found to support a wide variety of life forms.
The survey was part of a larger expedition to study underwater mountains aboard the RRS James Cook, which sailed from Cape Town on 7 November and returned to South Africa on 21 December. The exploration of the Dragon Vent took place in an intense three-day burst in the middle of the trip.
Copley's team took hundreds of samples of 17 different creatures, all of which are now being shipped back to his lab for detailed morphological and genetic examination. "Chances are that there will be several that are new species," he said. "We won't know for sure until we get them back into the lab and analyse them."
Copley's work builds on a Chinese expedition in 2007 that pinpointed the hydrothermal vents on the southwest Indian ridge for the first time. This chain of undersea volcanoes joins the mid-Atlantic ridge to the central Indian ridge. This part of the volcanic ridge is less volcanically active, so scientists think hydrothermal vents should be fewer and more scattered here. It therefore raises the question of whether life there is significantly different.
Copley said that characterising the life at the world's hydrothermal vents was a race against time. "Earlier this year, China was granted a licence by the UN International Seabed Authority for exploratory mining at deep-sea vents on the southwest Indian ridge," he said. "The vent chimneys are very rich in copper, zinc, gold and uranium. But we have no idea what's actually living there."
In evolutionary terms, hydrothermal vents were like the islands of the ocean floor, he added. "Just like the 19th century naturalists used to go to the Galápagos and other islands to find species there that are different to elsewhere and then use that to understand patterns of dispersal of dispersal and evolution, we can use deep-sea vents to do the same things beneath the waves," he said.
"And we need to do that because the exploitation of the deep ocean is overtaking its exploration. We're fishing in deeper and deeper waters, oil and gas is moving into deeper waters and now there's mining starting to take place in deep waters. We need to understand how species disperse and evolve in the deep oceans if we're going to make responsible decisions about managing their resources."
Tuesday, January 3, 2012
Tuesday, December 27, 2011
True Blue
Brian Skerry's Description of Right Whale Encounter:
2012 Tribute to Jacques Cousteau:
2012 Joe Romeiro White Shark:
BBC's Earth Flight New Series:
Randy Jordan of Emerald Charters found an airplane in 180 feet of water off Palm Beach Florida:
Experts there told Jordan that the submerged aircraft could be a Curtiss Helldiver SBC2. Some of those airplanes flew in the early 1940s during World War II.
So here we are. At the finish line. 10 month in the making. 7 minutes long. It has taken hundred of dives and thousands of takes. It has cost us a small fortune and most of our sanity. But it is done. We hope you enjoy it. We hope you get behind us. There is much yet to do. Please share it and please buy it. Sing it far and wide. This is our chance to sing for our oceans. The proceeds from the sale of the song will be given to the organisations shown @ 5:40.
From Blue Tube TV:
The ocean makes life on Earth possible, and it needs our help. Most people don't realize the long list of benefits the ocean provides us, nor how much we are connected and dependent on it. Just to name a few things; the ocean produces 70 to 80% of the oxygen we breath, generates $21 trillion in ecosystem services each year, and provides the main source of protein for 1/4 of the world's population. And these are just a few of the amazing functions it offers this planet's 6+billion people. In the past 50 years the health of the ocean has declined dramatically due to the major 5. That's right, the major 5, There are five serious threats that are causing this havoc; over fishing, pollution, invasive species, habitat destruction, and climate change. Actions must be taken to address these problems in order for the ocean to recover and become healthy once again. Come explore the ocean with us and find out how you can help.
Blue Tube TV Promo Trailer:
2012 Tribute to Jacques Cousteau:
2012 Joe Romeiro White Shark:
BBC's Earth Flight New Series:
Randy Jordan of Emerald Charters found an airplane in 180 feet of water off Palm Beach Florida:
Experts there told Jordan that the submerged aircraft could be a Curtiss Helldiver SBC2. Some of those airplanes flew in the early 1940s during World War II.
So here we are. At the finish line. 10 month in the making. 7 minutes long. It has taken hundred of dives and thousands of takes. It has cost us a small fortune and most of our sanity. But it is done. We hope you enjoy it. We hope you get behind us. There is much yet to do. Please share it and please buy it. Sing it far and wide. This is our chance to sing for our oceans. The proceeds from the sale of the song will be given to the organisations shown @ 5:40.
From Blue Tube TV:
The ocean makes life on Earth possible, and it needs our help. Most people don't realize the long list of benefits the ocean provides us, nor how much we are connected and dependent on it. Just to name a few things; the ocean produces 70 to 80% of the oxygen we breath, generates $21 trillion in ecosystem services each year, and provides the main source of protein for 1/4 of the world's population. And these are just a few of the amazing functions it offers this planet's 6+billion people. In the past 50 years the health of the ocean has declined dramatically due to the major 5. That's right, the major 5, There are five serious threats that are causing this havoc; over fishing, pollution, invasive species, habitat destruction, and climate change. Actions must be taken to address these problems in order for the ocean to recover and become healthy once again. Come explore the ocean with us and find out how you can help.
Blue Tube TV Promo Trailer:
Plastic Shores Trailer
Plastic Shores Trailer
A non-profit educational film about the effects of plastic debris on our marine ecosystem.
In the year 2010 global plastic production reached 300 million tonnes. A third of this was used in disposable packaging. In the United Kingdom, 3 million tonnes of plastic are thrown away every year, 1% of the total amount of all plastic manufactured on the planet.
But what happens to this plastic when it is thrown away? Most of it makes its way to landfill. Some goes to recycling or incineration. The rest escapes into our environment, and to the world's oceans…and nobody knows how long it will stay there. Estimates range from decades to hundreds of thousands of years.
'Plastic Shores' is a documentary that explores how plastic affects the marine environment. Travelling from the International Marine Debris Conference in Hawai'i to the polluted Blue Flag beaches of Cornwall, the film reveals just how bad the problem of plastic debris is and how it harms aquatic life. There is now not a single beach or sea in the world that is not affected by plastic pollution and the problem is only increasing.
Plastic Shores will be released mid-2012.
A non-profit educational film about the effects of plastic debris on our marine ecosystem.
In the year 2010 global plastic production reached 300 million tonnes. A third of this was used in disposable packaging. In the United Kingdom, 3 million tonnes of plastic are thrown away every year, 1% of the total amount of all plastic manufactured on the planet.
But what happens to this plastic when it is thrown away? Most of it makes its way to landfill. Some goes to recycling or incineration. The rest escapes into our environment, and to the world's oceans…and nobody knows how long it will stay there. Estimates range from decades to hundreds of thousands of years.
'Plastic Shores' is a documentary that explores how plastic affects the marine environment. Travelling from the International Marine Debris Conference in Hawai'i to the polluted Blue Flag beaches of Cornwall, the film reveals just how bad the problem of plastic debris is and how it harms aquatic life. There is now not a single beach or sea in the world that is not affected by plastic pollution and the problem is only increasing.
Plastic Shores will be released mid-2012.
60 Minutes
Anderson Cooper on 60 Minutes:
Anderson Cooper takes viewers on an underwater adventure to one of the world's most vibrant coral reefs, an anomaly at a time when many of the world's reefs are in danger - or already dead.
Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7392092n#ixzz1hlUCIdpG
Anderson Cooper takes viewers on an underwater adventure to one of the world's most vibrant coral reefs, an anomaly at a time when many of the world's reefs are in danger - or already dead.
Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7392092n#ixzz1hlUCIdpG
Thursday, November 17, 2011
North Atlantic Bluefin Tuna
BlueFin Tuna Bait Ball: National Geo.:
Catching GinatTuna National Geographjic:
Wall Street Journal Reports:
Paul Watson on NABFT:
Record Sale: $396,000:
All-Time Record:
CBS News: NOAA:
PEW Trusts:
Greenpeace:
Catching GinatTuna National Geographjic:
Wall Street Journal Reports:
Paul Watson on NABFT:
Record Sale: $396,000:
All-Time Record:
CBS News: NOAA:
PEW Trusts:
Greenpeace:
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Neptune Canada's Channel
Grotto Hydrothermal Vent in 2 Minutes:
March of the Sea Pigs:
Water Column Creatures:
School of Sunfish:
Deep Sea Octopus:
Batman of the Deep:
Brittle Star Food Fight:
Videos from the sea-floor: underwater life, technology, exploration and research in the northeast Pacific Ocean near Canada's Vancouver Island.
ABOUT US
As part of Ocean Networks Canada, we are building the worlds first regional-scale underwater cabled ocean network that plugs directly into the Internet. People everywherecan surf the seafloor, while ocean scientists run deep-water experiments from labs and universities anywhere around the world.
March of the Sea Pigs:
Water Column Creatures:
School of Sunfish:
Deep Sea Octopus:
Batman of the Deep:
Brittle Star Food Fight:
Videos from the sea-floor: underwater life, technology, exploration and research in the northeast Pacific Ocean near Canada's Vancouver Island.
ABOUT US
As part of Ocean Networks Canada, we are building the worlds first regional-scale underwater cabled ocean network that plugs directly into the Internet. People everywherecan surf the seafloor, while ocean scientists run deep-water experiments from labs and universities anywhere around the world.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Deep Sea News' Dr. M & Miriam Swim the Largest Tank!
Marine biologists and Deep Sea News bloggers Miriam Goldstein and Dr. Craig McClain SCUBA diving in the Ocean Voyager exhibit at Georgia Aquarium:
Starlings in Amazing Flight
Murmuration from Sophie Windsor Clive:
From Wired Science:
Video of a massive starling flock turning and twisting over a river in Ireland has gone viral, and with good reason. Flocking starlings are one of nature’s most extraordinary sights: Just a few hundred birds moving as one is enough to convey a sense of suspended reality, and the flock filmed above the River Shannon contained thousands.
What makes possible the uncanny coordination of these murmurations, as starling flocks are so beautifully known? Until recently, it was hard to say. Scientists had to wait for the tools of high-powered video analysis and computational modeling. And when these were finally applied to starlings, they revealed patterns known less from biology than cutting-edge physics.
Starling flocks, it turns out, are best described with equations of “critical transitions” — systems that are poised to tip, to be almost instantly and completely transformed, like metals becoming magnetized or liquid turning to gas. Each starling in a flock is connected to every other. When a flock turns in unison, it’s a phase transition.
At the individual level, the rules guiding this are relatively simple. When a neighbor moves, so do you. Depending on the flock’s size and speed and its members’ flight physiologies, the large-scale pattern changes. What’s complicated, or at least unknown, is how criticality is created and maintained.
It’s easy for a starling to turn when its neighbor turns — but what physiological mechanisms allow it to happen almost simultaneously in two birds separated by hundreds of feet and hundreds of other birds? That remains to be discovered, and the implications extend beyond birds. Starlings may simply be the most visible and beautiful example of a biological criticality that also seems to operate in proteins and neurons, hinting at universal principles yet to be understood.
Murmuration from Sophie Windsor Clive on Vimeo.
From Wired Science:
Video of a massive starling flock turning and twisting over a river in Ireland has gone viral, and with good reason. Flocking starlings are one of nature’s most extraordinary sights: Just a few hundred birds moving as one is enough to convey a sense of suspended reality, and the flock filmed above the River Shannon contained thousands.
What makes possible the uncanny coordination of these murmurations, as starling flocks are so beautifully known? Until recently, it was hard to say. Scientists had to wait for the tools of high-powered video analysis and computational modeling. And when these were finally applied to starlings, they revealed patterns known less from biology than cutting-edge physics.
Starling flocks, it turns out, are best described with equations of “critical transitions” — systems that are poised to tip, to be almost instantly and completely transformed, like metals becoming magnetized or liquid turning to gas. Each starling in a flock is connected to every other. When a flock turns in unison, it’s a phase transition.
At the individual level, the rules guiding this are relatively simple. When a neighbor moves, so do you. Depending on the flock’s size and speed and its members’ flight physiologies, the large-scale pattern changes. What’s complicated, or at least unknown, is how criticality is created and maintained.
It’s easy for a starling to turn when its neighbor turns — but what physiological mechanisms allow it to happen almost simultaneously in two birds separated by hundreds of feet and hundreds of other birds? That remains to be discovered, and the implications extend beyond birds. Starlings may simply be the most visible and beautiful example of a biological criticality that also seems to operate in proteins and neurons, hinting at universal principles yet to be understood.
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
National Geographic Capturing Bioluminescence & MBARI's Selections!
MBARI's Locomotion in the Deep:
MBARI's California Hydrothermal Vents:
MBARI's Eerie Critters of the Deep
MBARI'sAnthology of Deep Sea Squids:
MBARI's Vampire Squid:
Macropinna:
MBARI's Humboldt Squid:
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