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Northern light show

Northern light show

Aurora borealis lights dance in the sky above the U.S. Coast Guard icebreaker Healy during an Arctic Shelf cruise in 2004. Join a team of researchers, led by Carin Ashjian…

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Hiding in plain sight

Hiding in plain sight

Single-celled organisms like this tintinnid are critical links in the ocean’s food web. Though ever-present in the world’s oceans, their microscopic sizes make them hard to sample and therefore hard…

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Rough seas sampling

Rough seas sampling

Rene Ayala of the Bermuda Institute of Oceanographic Science takes a splash while tending to a rosette sampler aboard the R/V Oceanus during a December 2008 cruise. The research was…

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Whale of a Buoy

Whale of a Buoy

Working in the recently renovated Coastal Research Laboratory at WHOI, engineering assistants Paul Fraser (top), Jim Dunn (center), and Kris Newhall put finishing touches on one of 10 surface buoys…

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A fleet of floats

A fleet of floats

Robotic floats — drifting instruments that measure ocean temperature and salinity — provide continuous monitoring of upper ocean conditions. Each float sinks to depths of 2,000 meters, drifts with ocean…

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Picturesque port

Picturesque port

R/V Oceanus chief mate Ethan Galac (left), bosun Clindor Cacho (center) and steward Jeff Avery (right) admire the view as the research vessel approaches St. George, Bermuda, in December 2008.…

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Dirty work

Dirty work

Haitham Aljahdali, of King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, or KAUST (left) and Alaa Albarakati (center) of King Abdulazziz University, both in Saudi Arabia, get their hands, and everything…

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Discovery in the Celebes

Discovery in the Celebes

In October 2007, U. S. and Filipino scientists traveled to the Celebes Sea in Southeast Asia, searching for new species living in its deep water. When they discovered this extraordinary…

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Studying moving fluids

Studying moving fluids

Physical oceanographer John Whitehead (far right) showed Russian oceanographers M. A. Bogdanov and B. B. Popov around his laboratory during a tour of WHOI in 1973, and explained an experiment…

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Polar Discovery: Bering Sea Ecosystem

Polar Discovery: Bering Sea Ecosystem

The Arctic ecosystem has a unique, complex food web that is fashioned by its distinctive plankton, animal species, and environmental factors. Copepods, like the one above, are a critical link…

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Fishing for an AUV

Fishing for an AUV

Senior scientist Al Plueddemann hooks the handle of the autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) REMUS so that it can be safely lifted onto the deck during a study of the wintertime…

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End of the rainbow?

End of the rainbow?

Bosun Clindor Cacho admires a rainbow as the Oceanus prepares to dock at St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands in November 2008, after a transit across the Atlantic. The ship, scientists,…

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Aloha, Nereus

Aloha, Nereus

After four years of design and construction, one of WHOI’s new deep-sea exploration vehicles, Nereus, took its first plunge in deeper waters during a test cruise in December 2007 off…

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Flying the Spanish flag

Flying the Spanish flag

The WHOI-operated research vessel Oceanus flew the Spanish flag during a stop in the Canary Islands in September, following oceanographic research by WHOI marine biogeochemist Phoebe Lam. (Photo by Alexander Dorsk, Woods…

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After the storm

After the storm

The R/V Oceanus‘ mast is reflected in a puddle of water at Penno’s Wharf in St. George, Bermuda, following a day of torrential rains that delayed the ship’s scheduled departure.…

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Double duty

Double duty

Because ship time is valuable, scientists at sea try to use every possible minute of a cruise, sometimes collecting samples for colleagues ashore during lulls in the shipboard activity. In…

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A surprising return

A surprising return

One of the “pumps” that helps drive the ocean’s global circulation suddenly switched on again last winter for the first time this decade. The “pump” is in the western North…

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Test before using

Test before using

In-port entertainment? A dockside test of a brand-new piece of oceanographic equipment takes place next to a massive cruise ship in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands. Aboard R/V Oceanus, WHOI…

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Generous gift for seafloor science

Generous gift for seafloor science

Able Seaman Jim McGill guides a multi-corer—resembling a lunar lander—off R/V Oceanus’ deck in the Bahamas in 2006, on a mission to collect tiny seafloor organisms. Multi-corers sample the seafloor…

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Getting into and out of hot water?

Getting into and out of hot water?

As R/V Oceanus Bosun Clindor Cacho (left) watches the oceanographic wire being pulled up out of the water, Alaa Albarakati of King Abdulaziz University, Saudi Arabia (standing), and WHOI researchers…

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“Red sky at morning…”

"Red sky at morning..."

“… sailors take warning.”  The old adage applies as WHOI’s ship R/V Oceanus sits at the dock in St. George, Bermuda one morning in December 2008, just before a big…

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