Multimedia Items
Relax with the Ocean (playlist)
Sit back and relax with this collection of ocean beauty shots and atmospheric music.
Read MoreWhy is the Greenland Ice Sheet melting faster than ever?
Senior scientist Claudia Cenedese has been studying how glaciers melt for the last 15 years in her fluids laboratory. In 2018 she was a principal investigator on a research cruise in Greenland for the first time. She wants to understand why the Greenland Ice Sheet is melting faster than ever and what happens to the fresh water released into the ocean.
Read MoreTagging Sharks to Study the Twilight Zone
Former WHOI Joint Program graduate student and current University of Washington postdoc Camrin Braun and his team on the charter fishing vessel Machaca managed to tag two porbeagles, a relative of the goblin shark, about 30 miles east of Chatham, Mass. One was a female nearly seven feet long and weighing 270 pounds. A male came alongside the boat while the team was tagging her and, when they were finished, they quickly hooked the curious male, which measured 6.5 feet and weighed 230 pounds.
Both fish are now equipped with fin-mounted SPOT satellite tags, which will report their location each time they surface and can last up to five years. For the Ocean Twilight Zone team, the big predators are an important indicator of where mesopelagic animals are collecting deep below the surface. In short, the predator will go where the prey is.
Read MoreLife at the Edge (video series)
Watch this two-part series following a group of scientists as they explore what makes the shelf break front such a productive and diverse part of the Northwest Atlantic Ocean.
Read MoreHoliday Dive
Happily working through the holidays: Alvin, shown here at the vent site more than 2000 meters (1.25 miles) below the surface being piloted by Alvin program manager Bruce Strickrott.
Read MoreA pop of red in the twilight zone
This bejeweled beauty is a strawberry squid (Histioteuthis reversa), sampled from the ocean twilight zone, a mysterious stratum of the ocean between the sunlit surface layer and extending down to about 1,000 meters (3,300 feet) deep.
Read MoreBrisingids sea stars are the velcro of the deep sea
This festive collection of bright orange filter-feeding brisingid sea stars and scavenging sea urchins were found on a rocky seamount about 700 meters (~2,300 feet) deep in the Phoenix […]
Read MoreAn icebreaker pauses
WHOI senior engineer Jeff O’Brien offloads an ice-tethered profiler buoy and winch from the CCGS Louis S. St-Laurent, a Canadian Coast Guard icebreaker, during the 2019 expedition (17th year) of WHOI’s Beaufort Gyre Expedition Exploration Project
Read MoreA tipping point
Emperor penguins (Aptenodytes forsteri) are the largest species of penguin and one of the most charismatic animals on Earth. Their lifecycle is dependent on sea ice for breeding, feeding and […]
Read MoreTremors of the deep sea
We can all imagine the devastation hurricanes bring ashore. Well it turns out that hurricanes could be just as devastating to denizens of the deep ocean.
Read MoreI spy a pilot whale
This spy-hopping adult female short-finned pilot whale (Globicephala macrorhynchus) was photographed offshore of Hawai‘i Island while checking out the Cascadia Research Collective field team during one of their field projects […]
Read MoreSparring Partner
The crew and science team on R/V Neil Armstrong deployed newly designed, 60-foot spar buoy for sea trials about 100 miles south of Cape Cod last week.
Read MoreNereid Under Ice explores Aurora hydrothermal vent field
The newly upgraded Nereid Under Ice, a hybrid remotely operated vehicle, is deployed from the Norwegian Icebreaker KronPrins Haakon to conduct its first deep ocean dives to 4,000 meters (over 13,000 feet) along the Gakkel Ridge in the Arctic Ocean.
Read MoreJellies of the Twilight Zone
Jellyfish have lived on earth more than 600 million years, and boast a diverse evolutionary history. Most jellyfish species live in the Twilight Zone. Little is known about this ocean region since it is vastly unexplored, but Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution is on a mission to change that. With their new Mesobot, the institution plans to study the Twilight Zone and the creatures that call it home.
Read MoreThe ghoulish grimace of the viperfish
Bred in darkness, raised to kill, this is the fearsome viperfish – Chauliodus sloani. (Photo by Paul Caiger, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)
Read MoreMicroplastics in the Ocean: Emergency or Exaggeration (event recording)
October 15, 2019 – Watch this recorded public event entitled Microplastics in the Ocean: Emergency of Exaggeration? with a keynote presentation by Dr. Kara Lavender Law on the science of ocean plastic pollution and laying the foundation for solutions.
Dr. Law is a faculty member at Sea Education Association, where she studies the distribution of plastic marine debris driven by ocean physics and the degradation and ultimate fate of plastics in the ocean.
Keynote presentation is followed by a panel discussion on the international perspectives on marine microplastics research moderated by Dr. Heather Goldstone, host of Living Lab, WCAI, Cape & Islands NPR. Panelists include:
Dr. Chelsea Rochman
University of Toronto, Canada
Dr. Hauke Kite-Powell
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, U.S.A.
Dr. Gunnar Gerdts
Alfred Wegener Institute, Germany
Dr. Hideshige Takada
Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, Japan
Dr. Collin Ward
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, U.S.A.
Sponsored by the Elisabeth W. and Henry A. Morss, Jr., Colloquia Endowed Fund
Learn more about marine microplastics here:
https://www.whoi.edu/know-your-ocean/ocean-topics/pollution/marine-microplastics/
Mola mola parade
A formation of four mola mola (ocean sunfish) paraded through the water past the starboard side of #RVNeilArmstrong last week, while mooring operations continued on the Ocean Observatories Initiative Pioneer Array, 130 miles southeast of Martha’s Vineyard. These giant omnivores are the largest bony fish (Osteichthyes) in the ocean, measuring up to 11 feet in height and weighing up to 2.5 tons. They get their common name from the fact that they can be sometimes be found turned sideways on the ocean surface basking in the sun. Leo Fitz, who has crewed on WHOI ships for decades said he’s never been so fortunate to see so many at once: ‘Never, it’s always one! Never THIS many!”
Read MoreNew Eyes in the Twilight Zone
Members of WHOI’s Ocean Twilight Zone team, particularly the lab led by marine biologist Annette Govindarajan, are pioneering the use of environmental DNA (eDNA) sampling and analysis to provide a more finely tuned picture of what lives deep beneath the surface of the ocean.
Read MoreLightning Deployment
The Sentry Team and deck crew on the research vessel Atlantis had to move quickly in order to launch the autonomous underwater vehicle between squalls off the West Coast recently.
Read MoreExtraordinary Footage of Octopus Garden
Need a break? Sit back, relax, and enjoy this stunning and calming underwater footage from Octopus Garden, two miles below the ocean’s surface in the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary (MBNMS), where thousands of mother octopuses were discovered nursing their eggs. Meditative soundtrack included.
Read MoreDiving to Octopus Garden in a Submarine
Check out this amazing footage taken from WHOI’s submersible Alvin in the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary (MBNMS), where thousands of mother octopuses were discovered nursing their eggs in a place known as Octopus Garden. WHOI principal engineer Andy Bowen talks with Chad King, a research specialist with MBNMS, about the animals and how federally-protected marine sanctuaries are critical to the health and protection of these incredible ecosystems.
Read MoreDiscover Octopus Garden
Watch this amazing footage and learn some cool facts about octopus living two miles below the ocean’s surface, where thousands of mother octopuses were discovered nursing their eggs in a place known as Octopus Garden in Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary (MBNMS).
Read MoreObserving Mooring Deployment at Pioneer Array
Logan Johnsen, chief mate on the research vessel Neil Armstrong, stood watch on the bridge recently during a mooring deployment at the Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI) Pioneer Array. Instruments on the array record physical, chemical, and biological data from the seafloor to the surface and above around the clock, 365 days a year. Twice each year, a team from WHOI visits the Pioneer site, located about 100 miles south of Marthas Vineyard, to replace all of the moorings in the array and to deploy autonomous underwater vehicles that record data further afield.
Read MoreOrpheus explores the ocean’s greatest depths
Orpheus, an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) developed by WHOI, begins its descent into Veatch Canyon on the continental shelf off of the U.S. Northeast during one of several dives from the R/V Neil Armstrong in September 2019.
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