Sampling Gulf Stream plankton, one teaspoon at a time
Three questions with marine research technician Emily Peacock
These seabirds fly toward cyclones, not away from them
New GPS tracking on petrels reveals a surprising survival strategy hidden in the eye of the storm
Reclaiming knowledge from the sea
WHOI’s Jordan Kennedy draws on Indigenous knowledge, engineering, and observation to rethink how we study and restore coastal landscapes
3 questions with a former NASA astronaut
WHOI Corporation Member Sunita Williams discusses space exploration, ocean science, and environmental stewardship
Ships in the Strait of Hormuz are becoming invasive species breeding grounds
Beneath the waterline of every ship stalled in the Persian Gulf, a thriving underwater city takes shape—barnacles, algae, mussels, sea squirts. Some of those hitchhikers could reach coastlines they’d never find on their own.
Is the ocean carbon sink at risk of faltering?
WHOI scientists explain how the ocean mitigates climate change—and could be compromised by it
3 questions with Cam Braun
Marine biologist Camrin Braun explains why the world’s largest fish visit waters off Cape Cod—and what their epic migrations reveal about a changing ocean
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Is underwater noise from construction affecting the American Lobster?
WHOI’s Sensory Ecology Lab investigates whether an industrialized soundscape impacts the health of a New England icon
Exploring Atlantic seeps
AUV Sentry leads the way in mapping and monitoring methane bubbling from the seafloor
A once-in-a-generation dive into polar history
40 years after helping reveal the Titanic, Alvin returns to the North Atlantic to document two other legendary shipwrecks
A hadal zone mystery solved
An upside-down swimming isopod shows how tightly we are connected to the deep ocean
A mother seal dives
Follow a Weddell seal as her body adapts to foraging in deep, frigid waters
A mummy, a myth, and the Titanic
A 1986 handwritten letter to Bob Ballard revisits one of the Titanic disaster’s strangest myths
Turning motion into power: Wave energy converters for sustainable ocean monitoring
In the rapidly evolving world of ocean technology, wave energy is emerging as a promising…
The world’s most abundant fish once thrived in an extreme climate
Fossilized teeth show bristlemouth fish evolved during one of the ocean’s hottest periods
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How a cargo ship is tracking hidden ocean life in the Atlantic
With funding support from CMA CGM, ocean observations aboard Bermuda Container Line’s M/V Oleander now include a window into microscopic life
Alvin vs. the swordfish
During a 1967 dive off Florida, a startled swordfish rammed the famed submersible Alvin—lodging its sword in the hull and forcing the crew to abort the mission
Inside Room 71: WHOI history in seven artifacts
Some of the technology, art, and gifts that tell the story of the institution’s early days
A scientist’s quest to find Earth’s oldest ice
After recovering ice that dates back 6 million years, Sarah Shackleton hopes to dig deeper into Earth’s history from a remote Antarctic moraine
It’s the most ocean-friendly map ever created. Why haven’t more people seen it?
Discover the Spilhaus Projection, a radical world map that reveals Earth as one connected ocean—and reshapes how we see the planet.
Luxury cruises with a side of climate science
A new partnership gives scientists rare access to remote Antarctic glaciers—and a new way to engage the public
The unseen toll of war on science
As the changing climate accelerates the spread of toxic algal blooms in the Arctic, the Russia–Ukraine war is cutting off critical international collaboration needed to understand and protect vulnerable ecosystems and communities.
The human cost of Brazil’s floods
New research maps social vulnerability after the 2024 deluge
Hitting the Hotspots
The great volcanic mid-ocean ridge system stretches continuously around the globe for 60,000 kilometers, nearly all of it hidden beneath the world’s oceans.
Life on the Seafloor and Elsewhere in the Solar System
The RIDGE program (Ridge Inter-Disciplinary Globe Experiments) was sharply focused on the global spreading center system, but the program’s goals were broadly defined. RIDGE was designed to explore the causes, consequences, and linkages associated with the physical, chemical, and biological processes that transfer mass and energy from the interior to the surface of the planet along the mid-ocean ridges.
Deep-Sea Diaspora
When spectacular biological communities were first discovered at hydrothermal vents in 1977, biologists puzzled over two main questions: How did these oases of large and abundant animals persist in the deep sea, where food is typically scarce? And how did these unusual species, which occur only at vents, manage to colonize new vents and avoid extinction when old vents shut down?
The Cauldron Beneath the Seafloor
Just over 20 years ago, scientists exploring the mid-ocean ridge system first made the spectacular discovery of black smokers—hydrothermal chimneys made of metal sulfide minerals that vigorously discharge hot, dark, particulate-laden fluids into the ocean.
“Nothing Could Diminish the Excitement Of Seeing the Animals for the First Time”
The scientists who made the surprising discovery of teeming life around hydrothermal vents of the Galápagos Rift in 1977 were geologists and geochemists. They had not expected to find spectacular colonies of previously unknown, large animals on the deep seafloor.
The Big MELT
More than 95 percent of the earth’s volcanic magma is generated beneath the seafloor at mid-ocean ridges.
Mid-Atlantic Ridge Volcanic Processes
Long before the plate-tectonic revolution began in the 1960s, scientists envisioned drilling into the ocean crust to investigate Earth’s evolution.
Indian Ocean’s Atlantis Bank Yields Deep-Earth Insight
I never imagined I would spend six weeks of my life “wandering around” the seafloor exploring an 11 million year old beach, and it never occurred to me to look for a fossil island. But that’s what I did, and that’s what we found on two research voyages separated by more than a decade.
Melt Extraction from the Mantle Beneath Mid-Ocean Ridges
As the oceanic plates move apart at mid-ocean ridges, rocks from Earth’s mantle, far below, rise to fill the void, mostly via slow plastic flow.
Exploring The Global Mid-Ocean Ridge
There is a natural tendency in scientific investigations for increased specialization. Most important advances are made by narrowing focus and building on the broad foundation of earlier, more general research.
Discovery of “Megamullions” Reveals Gateways Into the Ocean Crust and Upper Mantle
urposes. From the end of the nineteenth into the first half of the twentieth century, drilling was used to penetrate the reef and uppermost volcanic foundation of several oceanic islands, and these glimpses of oceanic geology whetted the scientific community’s appetite for deeper and more complete data.
Ocean Seismic Network Seafloor Observatories
Our knowledge of the physical characteristics of Earth’s deep interior is based largely on observations of surface vibrations that occur after large earthquakes. Using the same techniques as CAT (Computer Aided Tomography) scans in medical imaging, seismologists can “image” the interior of our planet. But just as medical imaging requires sensors that surround the patient, seismic imaging requires sensors surrounding the earth.