Research Highlight
Tropical fish…up north? How ocean physics play a role in altering water temperature and salinity
A study led by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution scientists is explaining why warm and salty water along with warm water fish species, such as the deep-sea dwelling Gulf Stream flounder and Black Sea bass, were found far inshore in New England in the middle of winter 2017. How did this happen? Researchers say it is due to an intrusion of offshore water from the open ocean onto the Northeast U.S. Shelf, caused by eddies (a circular current of water) and wind.
Read MoreStudy finds bio-based cellulose acetate plastic used in consumer goods disintegrates in ocean much faster than assumed
Woods Hole, MA — Cellulose diacetate (CDA), a bio-based plastic widely used in consumer goods, disintegrates, and degrades in the ocean far quicker than previously assumed, according to a new…
Read MoreAn ocean of opportunity
Ocean experts explore the potential risks and rewards of ocean-based solutions to climate change
Read MoreA curious robot is poised to rapidly expand reef research
WHOI scientists with the Coral Catalyst Team are leveraging a new, artificially intelligent robot to automate coral reef health assessments
Read MoreStudy outlines challenges to ongoing clean-up of burnt and unburnt nurdles along Sri Lanka’s coastline
When a fire broke out on the deck of the M/V XPress Pearl cargo ship on May 20, 2021, an estimated 70-75 billion pellets of preproduction plastic material, known as nurdles, spilled into the ocean and along the Sri Lankan coastline. That spill of about 1,500 tons of nurdles, many of which were burnt by the fire, has threatened marine life and poses a complex clean-up challenge. A new peer-reviewed study characterizes how the fire modified the physical and chemical properties of the nurdles and proposes that these properties affected their distribution along the coast.
Read MoreA coral reef kickstart
WHOI’s Reef Solutions Initiative takes a multi-disciplinary approach to investigate solutions for ailing coral reefs
Read More“Mantle wind” blows through slab window beneath Panama
A Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution-led team unravels the existence of a 900-mile-long mantle conduit between the Galapagos and Central America Woods Hole, MA — Volcanic gases are helping researchers track…
Read MoreDOE Funding will Support WHOI Research to Support Sustainable Development of Offshore Wind
Woods Hole, MA — The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) has received $750,000 in funding from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to develop next‐generation autonomous robotic technology for environmental…
Read MoreWHOI Arctic experts present at international climate conference overseas
Experts from WHOI and Woodwell Climate Research Center are on the ground at COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland, sharing critical perspective on the implications of a warming Arctic
Read MoreEnvironmental DNA is a reliable way to learn about migration from the twilight zone
Woods Hole, MA — The mid-ocean “twilight zone” holds the key to several tantalizing questions about the marine food web and carbon-sequestering capacity of the ocean. But studying this vast…
Read MoreWHOI multidisciplinary team selected for prestigious National Science Foundation Program
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) has been selected by the U.S National Science Foundation (NSF) for phase one of a two-part Convergence Accelerator Program, a $21 million investment to advance use-inspired solutions addressing national-scale societal challenges. WHOI is one of sixteen teams across the US chosen to participate in Track E: The Networked Blue Economy, which aims to create a smart, integrated, connected, and open ecosystem for ocean innovation, exploration, and sustainable utilization.
Read MoreSummer with Sentry: Intern Renee Gruner-Mitchell
Renee Gruner-Mitchell on her internship working on AUV Sentry at the National Deep Submergence Facility during the summer of 2021.
Read MoreFive marine living fossils you should know about
After living for millions of years, these species may have mastered evolution in our ocean
Read MoreFor Cynthia Becker, solutions to coral health are in the smallest details
MIT-WHOI Joint Program student Cynthia Becker sits down with Oceanus Magazine to explain why marine microbes may be the key to diagnosing reef health
Read MoreMeasuring the great migration
A bioacoustic mooring will use sound to help estimate life migrating in the ocean’s twilight zone as part of a new long-term observation network in the Atlantic
Read MoreFlipping the “genetic paradox of invasions”
A new study led by Carolyn Tepolt, an associate scientist of biology at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, is investigating the adaptive mechanisms of the green crab along the west coast of North America, where it has shown extensive dispersal in the last decade despite minimal genetic diversity.
Read MoreA recent reversal in the response of western Greenland’s ice caps to climate change
New collaborative research from the WHOI and five partner institutions published today in Nature Geoscience, reveals that during past periods glaciers and ice caps in coastal west Greenland experienced climate conditions much different than the interior of Greenland. Over the past 2,000 years, these ice caps endured periods of warming during which they grew larger rather than shrinking.
Read MoreWHOI selected for new NSF science & technology center
The new Center for Chemical Currencies of a Microbial Planet (C-CoMP) will focus on the chemical processes that underpin ocean ecosystems.
Read MoreSunlight can break down marine plastic into tens of thousands of chemical compounds, study finds
Sunlight was once thought to only fragment plastics in the marine environment into smaller particles that chemically resemble the original material and persist forever. However, scientists more recently have learned that sunlight also chemically transforms plastic into a suite of polymer-, dissolved-, and gas-phased products. Now, a new study finds that this chemical reaction can produce tens of thousands of water-soluble compounds, or formulas.
Read MoreSome coral reefs are keeping pace with ocean warming
Some coral communities are becoming more heat tolerant as ocean temperatures rise, offering hope for corals in a changing climate. After a series of marine heatwaves hit the Phoenix Islands Protected Area (PIPA) in the central Pacific Ocean, a new study finds the impact of heat stress on the coral communities lessened over time.
Read MoreSurviving extreme heat
A team led by Anne Cohen, a scientist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, received $1.75M in funding from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to study how coral reefs survive extreme heat events caused by climate change. The multidisciplinary project taps into expertise across four WHOI departments to uncover the oceanographic and biological processes that enable corals to survive marine heatwaves.
Read More‘Rolls-Royce’ of shark cameras can extend to turtles, whales, seals and squid for ocean’s big picture
A high-tech SharkCam invented by a Cape Cod researcher offers an unprecedented window into the lives of the ocean’s toothy predators, and can also extend to seals, whales, turtles and…
Read MoreWHOI advancing a seaweed solution to develop new kelp strains
A leader in ocean science, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) is embarking on a study of how new seaweed strains could further enhance the burgeoning seaweed industry and offer solutions to some of the world’s pressing challenges. This research is funded in part by World Wildlife Fund (WWF) with support from the Bezos Earth Fund.
Read MoreNew Study Finds Emperor Penguins Increasingly Threatened by Climate Change
A new study published today in Global Change Biology provides valuable new data that highlights how species extinction risk is accelerating due to rapid climate change and an increase in extreme climate events, such as glacial calving and sea ice loss.
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