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| 1. Andrew McDonnell, a joint program student in marine chemistry and geochemistry, holds a jar full of sinking particles collected at 150 meters depth during a cruise along the West Antarctic Peninsula. These particles—mostly krill fecal pellets and diatom aggregates—are an important component of the ocean's natural carbon cycle. As they sink through the water column, they transport carbon away from the atmosphere and surface ocean and deliver it to the deep waters and sediments. This special sample jar is full of a viscous polyacrylamide gel that keeps particles separated and intact upon collection, allowing for the enumeration, measurement, and identification of particles that are important to the sinking flux.
(Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | 2. WHOI Senior Scientist Larry Pratt of the Physical Oceanography Department and MIT/WHOI Joint Program students Wilken-Jon von Appen and Ping Zhai test a volume flow rate formula developed in one of their classes during a field trip to Oyster Pond in West Falmouth. “One of the central topics in the class is the dense overflows found in numerous sites in the deep ocean. Large volumes of dense water spill down into the abyssal ocean at these sites, much like water flowing over a dam,” says Pratt. The tidal stream in West Falmouth provides a small-scale example of spilling flows.
(Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 3. Students from the WHOI Summer Student Fellowship Program and the Woods Hole Partnership Education Program (PEP) spent a sunny August day out on R/V Tioga learning basic oceanographic sampling techniques from instructors (and retired researchers) Hovey Clifford, Bruce Tripp, George Hampson, and Jim Doutt. Both programs are designed to give students in their junior or senior year of college hands-on experience in ocean science. (Photo by Jayne Doucette, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | 4. In experimental tanks at WHOI, guest student Tyler Goepfert grows different species of marine algae to test which might be best suited for harvesting and converting into biofuels. Goepfert is working with WHOI marine chemists Chris Reddy and Mak Saito, and Scott Lindell of the Marine Biological Laboratory on a project to provide insights that could sustain and optimize large-scale biofuel production. Theoretically, algae could yield 20 times more biofuel per acre than those made of vegetables such as soybeans—in part because they grow extremely fast.
(Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 5. Oceanographer Emeritus and biologist George Hampson (center) and Hovey Clifford (blue shirt) retired WHOI dockmaster and present CPR teacher and EMT showing Summer Student Fellows Yadira Ibarra (left) and Abigail Labella (right) how to collect tiny animal samples from a sieve. After collecting the samples they will further inspect the samples under a microscope in the lab on R/V Tioga. (Photo by Jayne Doucette, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 6. Jordan Aoyama, a student in the Woods Hole Partnership Education Program (PEP) sponsored by the Woods Hole Diversity Advisory Committee, learns sextant skills from R/V Tioga captain Ken Houtler during a day cruise aboard the vessel to learn basic oceanographic sampling techniques. The PEP program is designed to give students in their junior or senior year of college hands-on experience in ocean science. (Photo by Jayne Doucette, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 7. The Deep Submergence Laboratory’s mission is to further human understanding of the deep-sea floor by developing systems for remote, unmanned exploration. Here MIT/WHOI Joint Program Student Jordan Stanway tests propellers for the autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) Sentry. AUVs are used when long-term monitoring of the ocean or seafloor is needed. Research completed with autonomous and remotely operated vehicles provides major contributions to the understanding of deep-sea geological, chemical and biological processes at mid-ocean ridges. (Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | 8. For his graduate research, WHOI postdoctoral investigator Jonathan Blythe studied the intertidal barnacle Semibalanus balanoides at Gardiner Beach in Woods Hole. He focused on the transition between the larval and adult stages of the barnacle lifecycle and the creature's ability to cope with varying environmental conditions such as wind and wave action. "It appears that barnacles have evolved to compete for suitable habitat and have mechanisms to cope with seasonally varying environmental conditions in the benthic habitat," Blythe writes on his research web page.
(Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 9. WHOI postdoctoral scientist Aran Mooney, shown here in the WHOI Computerized Scanning and Imaging facility, studies marine animal hearing. He and colleagues recently investigated the effects of sonar sound on a captive dolphin, finding that "prolonged, high sound exposure levels" produced a temporary effect on hearing and behavior. The results, published online on April 8, 2009 in Biology Letters, generated headlines in the popular media. (Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 10. September 24, 2009 marked the first annual “National Postdoc Appreciation Day” to celebrate the significant contribution that postdocs make to the U.S. scientific endeavor. What’s a “postdoc?” Few non-scientists are aware of this brief phase in many scientists’ careers, after they have already spent five to six years earning a Ph.D. It’s often an intense period of research, so it’s rare to find so many postdocs gathered in one place, as they are above for an annual postdoc breakfast at WHOI. Read more about postdocs on Oceanus, or about postdoctoral programs at WHOI. (Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 11. Five students did research internships this summer at WHOI in the new Partnership Education Program (PEP) to encourage underrepresented groups into the fields of ocean and environmental sciences (left to right): Sanya Compton (Savannah State University), Zak Balmuth-Loris (Syracuse University), Adrienne George (Delaware State University), Shamgan Perkins (Savannah State University), and Melissa Pinard (Morgan State University). (Photo courtesy of George Liles and Ambrose Jearld, Jr., NEFSC) | | 12. Retired WHOI researcher Hovey Clifford instructs Summer Student Fellow Tara Hetz in collecting animals derived from towed samples during the recent cruise onboard R/V Tioga. The glass dish they are looking at was heavily made up of two groups, ctenophores (jellies) and a host of postlarval crustaceans that were likely baby spider crabs. (Photo by Jayne Doucette, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 13. New graduate students in the MIT/WHOI Joint Program gather alongside ship's crew on the deck of the Corwith Cramer for the annual Sea Education Association (SEA) Jake Peirson Summer Cruise. They set sail on June 25, 2009, for a week-long cruise to develop their skills in ocean sampling and sea-faring. The cruise is also an opportunity for the students to bond with the classmates that they will study with, work alongside, and commiserate with for the next four to six years. (Photo by Jayne Doucette, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 14. Summer Student Fellow Sam Zipper spent his summer on balmy Cape Cod studying the western Canadian Arctic. Zipper analyzed sediment cores from the Mackenzie River Delta with his WHOI sponsor, Liviu Giosan. The team constructed a sediment flux record for the last 1,000 years in order to see how the permafrost responds to climate change. (Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 15. Summer Student Fellow (SSF) Gar Secrist (left), an ecological biologist, examines tubeworms or Tevnia jerichonana alongside WHOI biologist Lauren Mullineaux, who was also an SSF as an undergraduate. Her laboratory collected many biological samples from P-Vent on the East Pacific Rise, and Secrist's task was to study and count the variety of creatures through a microscope. With this data, they hoped to gain a better understanding about the recolonization of hydrothermal vent populations after volcanic eruptions. (Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 16. Summer Student Fellow Rose Kantor spent her summer working with marine chemist Tracy Mincer studying quorum sensing in microbes associated with sinking particles in the ocean water column. Quorum sensing is a process where bacteria gauge the density of related cells in their environment so they can coordinate behavior. Kantor was responsible for isolating pure cultures of bacteria, freezing them, and sequencing their DNA, enabling her to identify each culture and study how they regulate the expression of the gene encoding the hydrolytic enzymes they use to communicate. (Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 17. Summer Student Fellow Erica Hildebrand of Connecticut College spent her summer working with WHOI biologist Stefan Sievert on a project to assess the microbial community composition of five distinct low-temperature (10ºC – 50ºC) diffuse flow deep-sea hydrothermal vents located on the East Pacific Rise at 9ºN. The vents have been repeatedly sampled over a period of 2 years subsequently to a volcanic eruption that occurred at this site in late 2005 to early 2006. Fluids were collected using a large volume pump to concentrate the microorganisms onto filters. Erica, shown here in Sievert’s Lab for Microbial Ecology and Physiology, is extracting DNA from some of the filters. (Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 18. Cara Manning (center), a 2009 Summer Student Fellow from the University of Victoria, Canada, works in the lab. She investigated how much nitrous oxide — a potent greenhouse gas — is entering Oyster Pond from sources other than the atmosphere, how much is being generated by microbial metabolic processes in the pond, and how much is released into the atmosphere. Oyster Pond, a Cape Cod kettle pond, has a high surrounding population density that is probably changing the pond’s chemistry. Using an inflatable boat, Manning collected water samples and incubated bacteria in the samples with different nutrients to see whether they produced more or less nitrous oxide. Her WHOI co-sponsors were Associate Scientist Karen Casciotti and Assistant Scientist Dierdre Toole. (Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 19. Summer Student Fellow William Goldsmith fishes for research off the Iselin dock this past summer. Goldsmith, of Harvard University, worked in WHOI’s Fish Ecology Lab alongside biologist Simon Thorrold. The summer program gives undergraduate students an opportunity to get hands-on oceanographic research experience working with world-class scientists and engineers. (Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | 20. A trip to the snow? Actually, it's mineral, not ice, as WHOI graduate program student Evelyn Mervine collects recently-deposited carbonate from a highly alkaline spring in the Samail Ophiolite—an area of uplifted ocean crust in Oman. Mervine studies the formation of travertine, which draws the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide from the air, and its role in the global carbon cycle.
(Photo courtesy of Evelyn Mervine, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | | 21. Summer Student Fellow Abigail LaBella —shown here collecting fish samples from Scorton Creek in Sandwich, MA — spent her summer studying the genetic interaction between hypoxia (low oxygen) and endocrine disruptors alongside biologist Ann Tarrant. The fellowship program gives college juniors and seniors an opportunity to get hands-on oceanographic research experience. (Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | 22. Matt First, a postdoctoral scholar in the WHOI Geology and Geophysics Department, studies “Trojan horses” in the sea — single-celled animals that harbor disease-causing bacteria inside them. “These protists don’t harm people, but they could contain pathogenic bacteria, sometimes in very high concentrations,” First said. Learn more about his research in Oceanus magazine.
(Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) | Last updated: February 26, 2010 |
