Microscopic Vision

WHOI biologists Robert Olson and Heidi Sosik created the Imaging FlowCytobot, which photographs, identifies, and counts plankton cells in the ocean 24 hours a day for months at a time and relays information back to shore via fiber-optic cable or satellite. Recently, scientists using the Imaging FlowCytobot in the Arctic Ocean discovered a huge phytoplankton bloom under meter-thick ice, where they previously thought phytoplankton (which requires sunlight) could not grow. In 2012, the Imaging FlowCytobot was licensed to Falmouth, Mass.-based McLane Research Laboratories, which will manufacture and sell the instrument.(Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)