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Listening to the Ocean

A group of scientists and engineers from WHOI, University of Washington, and Penn State checks a ship-towed sound source in the test pool at WHOI’s Reinhart Coastal Research Center. The team was preparing for a two-week cruise in March 2011 aboard the R/V Hugh Sharp to study the acoustic properties of shallow waters off the coast of New Jersey. The finely tuned instrument was also used to study the effect that seafloor structure has on sound propogation–an important piece of knowledge for geologists who use sound to peer deep beneath Earth’s crust.(Photo by Neil McPhee, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)