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Coring Yellowstone Lake

March 28, 2017

Tourists visiting Yellowstone National Park can see steaming fissures, bubbling mudpots, and explosive geysers from roadside stops. But beneath the surface of Yellowstone Lake, hidden from view, is a fount of hydrothermal activity. WHOI scientist Rob Sohn, who has explored hydrothermal vents on the deep seafloor, is leading the HD-YLAKE project—a multiyear expedition that brings deep-sea technology to investigate the lake bottom. The research team emloyed a drilling platform operated by the National Lacustrine Core Facility at the University of Minnesota to extract long sediments cores from the lake floor, which hold clues to past events in the lake’s geologic and climate history. (Photo by Chris Linder, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)