Press Room
Scientists have long known of organisms adapted to environments that appear inhosptable to any form of life, living in the 600-700??F waters of hydrothermal vents on the sea fl oor, in pitchdark mine shafts a mile below ground, or clinging […]
Bubbles stream from vents surrounding misshapen cones formed by thick liquid oozing from the sea floor. It may sound like a hydrothermal vent field near a mid-ocean ridge, but these vents are located in shallow water, only a kilometer (about […]
Currents, fronts and eddies, often called the internal weather of the sea, are major components of ocean circulation and can change the chemical and biological environment in the ocean. Four cruises are being conducted as part of the Eddy Dynamics, […]
Additional Contact:
Justin Kenney
The Pew Charitable Trusts
215-575-4816, jkenney@pewtrusts.org
(Washington, D.C.) The Pew Charitable Trusts, in collaboration with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), announces the establishment of the Marine Aquaculture Task Forcecomprising leaders from the worlds of science, […]
Large regions of the North Atlantic Ocean have been growing fresher since the late 1960s as melting glaciers and increased precipitation, both associated with greenhouse warming, have enhanced continental runoff into the Arctic and sub-Arctic seas. Over the same time […]
Using inflatable boats, a portable depth sounder with GPS, and a REMUS autonomous underwater vehicle, a team of scientists and engineers has created the first detailed, comprehensive chart of the ocean floor around Palmer Station in Antarctica, revealing previously unknown […]
As summer vacations approach, beachgoers might want to bring along a guide to what they and their children will see on the beach and in the water. WHOI scientists and educators have created Beachcomber’s Companion for adventures at the beach. […]
With hurricane season arriving June 1, along with predictions of an above normal number of major storms in the Atlantic and Gulf States, understanding how the ocean and atmospheric interact and what role changing climate has on the formation of […]
Commonly called “red tides,” harmful algal blooms, or HABs, are an abundance or “bloom” of single-celled marine algae called phytoplankton that grow and multiply under the right conditions. Among the thousands of phytoplankton species, most are harmless and only a […]
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution recently honored The G. Unger Vetlesen Foundation of New York with the prestigious Cecil H. Green Award. The award, named for Texas Instruments’ founder and philanthropist Cecil H. Green, is presented to those who have made […]
With shellfish beds from Maine to the Cape Cod coast closed from the largest outbreak of red tide in 12 years in Massachusetts Bay, scientists from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) are studying the algae that causes these “red […]
An international team of scientists, led by researchers at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of Oregon and University of Sydney, has discovered an active underwater volcano near the Samoan Island chain about 2,400 miles southwest […]
Cadmium, commonly considered a toxic metal and often used in combination with nickel in batteries, has been found to have a biological use as a nutrient in the ocean, the first known biological use of cadmium in any life form.
Scientists […]
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) Senior Scientist Stanley Hart of the Geology and Geophysics Department was recently elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, one of the oldest learned societies in the nation. Dr. Hart is […]
In 2002, researchers diving in the submersible Alvin returned to the Galápagos Rift, a mid-ocean ridge about 250 miles from the Galápagos Islands in the eastern Pacific Ocean where hydrothermal vents and exotic organisms were first found in 1977. They […]
A miniature computer weighing less than 5 ounces attached to the backs of beaked whales with suction cups is providing new clues to the behavior and sounds made by the deep-diving reclusive species. Little is known about these mid-sized toothed […]
WHOI research vessels are exploring the oceans this spring from Bermuda to the Bay of Fundy in the North Atlantic and from Mexico to the Galápagos Islands in the eastern Pacific, conducting studies related to climate change, harmful algal blooms, […]
Layers of salty ocean water mix with layers of fresher water, creating a salty staircase or layering driven by small-scale convection known as salt fingers. Although scientists have known about salt fingers since 1960, when they were discovered at the […]
Scientists, natural resource managers and students from four continents will gather at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) April 21 and 22 to discuss a growing global problem: the sea squirt.
The mysterious filter feeding organism, a didemnid also known as […]
Corals from Papua New Guinea and Barbados indicate that changes in sea level, one of the key indexes for global climate change, may have been more frequent in the past than previously thought, according to a report in today’s issue […]