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WHOI in the News


New Ocean Buoy Monitors Whales Off MD.’s Atlantic Coast

Chesapeake Bay Magazine

The buoy is equipped with a hydrophone to record marine mammal calls, and thanks to an algorithm, researchers will be able to determine whether they belong to a humpback, fin, sei, or a critically-endangered North Atlantic Right whale.

Alvin: Pioneer of the Deep

WPBT

The deep-sea submersible Alvin has brought explorers to extraordinary places for more than 50 years. Now, as Alvin is poised to continue its revolutionary scientific work, a new set of upgrades will take it deeper than ever before. A coproduction with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.

Icebergs Drifting from Canada to Southern Florida

Eco

Using high resolution seafloor mapping, radiocarbon dating and a new iceberg model, the team analyzed about 700 iceberg scours (“plow marks” on the seafloor left behind by the bottom parts of icebergs dragging through marine sediment) from Cape Hatteras, North Carolina to the Florida Keys.

Massive plankton blooms with very different ecosystem impacts

Science Daily

“The big mystery about plankton is what controls its distribution and abundance, and what conditions lead to big plankton blooms,” said Dennis McGillicuddy, Senior Scientist and Department Chair in Applied Ocean Physics and Engineering at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI).

Commerce Secretary Raimondo visits Woods Hole

WPRI

U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo visited Massachusetts on Friday to tour the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute (WHOI) and the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Northeast Fisheries Science Center. The former Rhode Island governor, who left state government midterm to join the Biden administration in March, said her work with NOAA started in the Ocean State, as the University of Rhode Island has long collaborated with the federal agency.

On the Verge of Extinction, These Whales Are Also Shrinking

New York Times
new york times

Most of the 360 or so North Atlantic right whales alive today bear scars from entanglements in fishing gear and collisions with speeding ships and, according to new study, they are much smaller than they should be. According to the authors of the new study, the best way to ensure the continued survival of the species is to pressure fishery managers in the United States and Canada to significantly reduce the amount of rope-based fishing gear and implement ship speed limits in the North Atlantic. “We all consume goods moved by the sea, and many eat lobsters,” said Michael Moore, a senior scientist with Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and co-author of the study. “If we all were to demand these management changes of our elected officials the situation would change drastically.”

Say hello to a vast underground ecosystem

MSU Today

The research team — led by Karen Lloyd, an associate professor at the University of Tennessee, and Donato Giovannelli, a professor at the University of Naples Federico II in Italy — found that this microbial ecosystem sequesters a huge amount of carbon dioxide.