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Welcome Aboard, SID-ISMS

January 7, 2012

WHOI researchers Craig Taylor and Ginny Edgcomb wheel SID-ISMS, a new water column sampler, to the main lab of R/V Atlantis in preparation for their 2011 research cruise in the Mediterranean Sea. SID-ISMS (Submerged Incubation Device-In Situ Microbial Sampler) collects water samples and conducts a variety of procedures on the cells in them while still at the depth the samples were collected. It was designed and built by Taylor, Edgcomb, and colleagues at McLane Research Laboratories. During the cruise, the instrument—which was on its inaugural trip—brought back invaluable samples of microbes, many of which could not have been collected using traditional sampling methods.(Photo by Cherie Winner, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)