| The Hunt for Red Hot Hydrothermal Vents |
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STEP 2: UNLEASH THE ROBOTIC 'CATS'?WHOI engineers built three new vehicles to search for hydrothermal vents beneath the Arctic Ocean. The first two are sleek, torpedo-shaped, free-swimming robots called Puma and Jaguar. Once the CTD provides a rough idea of where a plume is, Puma is deployed through a hole in the ice and programmed to conduct missions on its own, said WHOI engineer Hanu Singh (left, with MIT/WHOI graduate student Clay Kunz, right). Equipped with sonar and sensors to ?sniff out? telltale temperature, chemical, or particle signals of hydrothermal plumes, it is designed to help scientists track the plume to its vent source.
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Posted: April 15, 2008
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