Rapid trip to measure oil droplets

WHOI Senior Scientist Cabell Davis (left) and Joint Program graduate student Nick Loomis flank an ROV mounted with a small digital holographic camera before a rapid research trip in the Gulf of Mexico on the R/V Jack Fitz. Davis and Loomis used their imaging system on the ROV to measure oil droplets in undersea plumes spreading out from the Gulf oil spill. They worked with Debbie French-McCay of Applied Science Associates, Inc. (ASA) who needed the data for a computer model of the plume, and at sea with ocean chemist Jim Payne (also collaborating with ASA.) The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration funded the work.
(Photo by Yong Kim, Applied Science Associates, Inc.)