News Releases
A View from Down Under
While it may be summer in the southern hemisphere, it is still very cold on Antarctica, where WHOI researchers are conducting a number of projects on and around the continent. …
Read MoreNew Instrumentation May Help Scientists Understand Earthquake Mechanics
Hundreds of earthquakes occur every day around the world, most of them underneath the oceans, while the vast majority of instruments used to record earthquakes are on land. As a…
Read MoreMonitoring Baleen Whales with Autonomous Underwater Vehicles
Like robots of the deep, autonomous underwater vehicles, or AUVs, are growing in number and use in the oceans to perform scientific missions ranging from monitoring climate change to mapping…
Read MoreDeep Submergence Vehicle Alvin Overhaul in Action
Watch the latest progress on the overhaul of the three-person submersible Alvin at http://alvincam.whoi.edu/view/view.shtml. The sub has been ashore in Woods Hole, Massachusetts undergoing overhaul since November and will be…
Read MoreWarmer than a Hot Tub: Atlantic Ocean Temperatures Much Higher in the Past
Scientists have found evidence that tropical Atlantic Ocean temperatures may have once reached 107°F (42°C)about 25°F (14°C) higher than ocean temperatures today and warmer than a hot tub. The surprisingly…
Read MoreNew Sonar Method Offers Way to Assess Health of Squid Fisheries
California?s $30-million-a-year squid fishery has quadrupled in the past decade, but until now there has been no way to assess the continuing viability of squid stocks. A new sonar technique offers a window onto next year?s potential squid population.
Read MoreAutonomous Underwater Vehicle Maps Ancient Greek Shipwreck
Additional contact: Denise Brehm MIT News Office 617-253-2704 brehm@mit.edu After lying hidden for millennia off the coast of Greece, a sunken 4th century B.C. merchant ship and its cargo have…
Read MoreMagnetic Misfits: South Seeking Bacteria in the Northern Hemisphere
Magnetotactic bacteria contain chains of magnetic iron minerals that allow them to orient in the earth’s magnetic field much like living compass needles. These bacteria have long been observed to…
Read MoreWho Goes to Sea Wishing for Bad Weather?
Some physical oceanographers do, even if it is in January in the North Atlantic. Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) scientists will spend two weeks this month working south of the…
Read MoreChanges in the Antarctic Ecosystem: Salps versus Krill
WHOI biologists will travel to Antarctica in mid-February to study salps⎯transparent, gelatinous, planktonic animals that generate massive populations containing individuals 10 centimeters (about four inches) long and colonial chains many…
Read MoreClues in a Crater: From India to the Surface of Mars
Researchers from WHOI, Harvard, MIT and Princeton will conduct the second part of an intensive field and laboratory study this month at Lonar Crater in Maharashtra, India, looking for clues…
Read MoreRerouting of Major Rivers in Asia Provides Clues to Mountains of the Past
Scientists have long recognized that the collision of the earth’s great crustal plates generates mountain ranges and other features of the Earth’s surface. Yet the link between mountain uplift and…
Read MoreWHOI Seeks to Raise $200 Million in Comprehensive Campaign
The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) has announced a $200-million comprehensive campaign to raise endowment and unrestricted operating funds to support staff and ongoing research and education activities. The campaign…
Read MoreNoah’s Flood: New Evidence of Catastrophic Flooding in the Black Sea
Results from a July 2005 cruise in the Black Sea may settle a longstanding debate over evidence of a megaflood in the Black Sea, the so-called “Noah’s Flood.” Multibeam bathymetry…
Read MoreFine-tuning the Steps in the Intricate Climate Change Dance
New scientific findings are strengthening the case that the oceans and climate are linked in an intricate dance, and that rapid climate change may be related to how vigorously ocean…
Read MoreNew Technology for New Exploration of Hydrothermal Vents
Advances in undersea imaging systems, the development of new vehicles and instruments, and improved seafloor mapping capabilities have enabled scientists to explore areas of the deep sea in unprecedented detail. …
Read MoreWHOI Blog from AGU
Check the WHOI blog for news updates from the American Geophysical Union (AGU) fall meeting. More than 10,000 Earth, space and ocean scientists are converging on San Francisco this week…
Read MoreInsight into Freshwater Input to the North Atlantic Ocean
The strongest climate cooling event in the last 10,000 years occurred about 8,200 years ago. Known as the 8.2 ka event, it was an abrupt release of freshwater to the…
Read MoreDual Vehicle Operations a Sign of the Future in Seafloor Exploration
Deploying two or more underwater vehicles from a single vessel makes better use of ship time and personnel, but requires specific technical capabilities and careful scheduling. In the past, one…
Read MoreBouncing Among the Arctic Ice: The Ultimate Arctic Machine?
WHOI scientists exploring the largely unknown currents beneath the polar sea ice have designed and successfully tested a new float that drifts at various depths through the oceans measuring water…
Read MoreHow Squid Swim: The Difference Between Theory and Observation
For years, some engineers believed squid likely propelled themselves through water by creating vortex rings, forcing fluid out of their pipe shaped funnels to create smoke-ring-like structures. But the experience…
Read MoreDeep-sea Light Post Transforms the Ocean Floor into a Photography Studio
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution scientists (WHOI) and engineers have designed a portable deep-sea light post to illuminate the dark ocean floor. Up to now, scientists have been able to see…
Read MoreWHOI Announces New Vice President for Academic Programs and Dean
James Yoder, a professor of oceanography and former associate dean at the University of Rhode Island Graduate School of Oceanography, has been chosen Vice President for Academic Programs and Dean…
Read MoreNew Genetic Test Can Detect Clam Disease Crippling Shellfish Industry and Threatening Aquaculture Operations
A sensitive new genetic test can now detect a crippling disease called QPX occurring in clam beds from Cape Cod south to Virginia and north to Canada. Although it does…
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