“Establishing ecological baselines in the deep sea allows us to track changes over time and better understand the consequences of human actions,” said Chief Scientist Dr. Lisa Levin, a professor of biological oceanography at Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Check out some of the magnificent sights documented by ROV SuBastian during this expedition. The goal … Continued
“Our goal is to learn about the different types of animal and microbial communities that occur off Southern California. We’re actually in exploration mode: many of these areas have not been visited or studied before. Some of them have not even been mapped accurately.” Take a behind-the-scenes look into the #BiodiverseSCB expedition in this video.
When you hear the word ‘coral’ or the phrase ‘coral reefs,’ what image comes to mind? For most people, it is a light-soaked shallow-water coral reef teeming with life. This is a scene that many of us have become familiar with, either through a first-hand experience of scuba diving or snorkeling in tropical waters or … Continued
The expanding reach of humankind has plunged far into the unknown, which is also home to the largest ecosystem on the planet. Throughout parts of the seafloor are untapped sources of rare earth metals including gold, silver and copper, and more importantly sulfide, zinc, manganese, and cobalt. These resources are necessary ingredients in manufacturing the … Continued
Seven days have gone past since we set sail from Astoria, and every day we have looked at these methane seeps. Bubbles, nosy sablefish, half-buried clams, and colorful corals have dominated our ROV feeds from SuBastian. But in this log, I would like to shed a little light on a different aspect of all of … Continued
Jagged piles of molten rock, sulfurous smoke, exploding gaseous emissions, shifting landscapes, otherworldly creatures, scalding acidic fluids, swirling plumes of volcanic gasses and particles, and crushing pressure of the overlying sea: what is not to like about active submarine volcanoes? If that’s not reason enough for come to these places, how about an opportunity to … Continued
Volcanic activity is enthralling, but when observed deep below the seafloor from a Remotely Operated Vehicle, like SuBastian, it has an additional mysterious and dream-like quality. Over the course of the next six weeks, Falkor will be sailing over one of the most active underwater volcano sites in the world, the Mata Volcano group.
Falkor’s journey from Nah Trang, Vietnam to the island of Guam was over nearly 1200 nautical miles of open ocean, of which the majority is uncharted – despite being in an area of strong scientific interest. Even with no scientists on board, Schmidt Ocean Institute’s Technicians always aim to run a suite of science sensors as … Continued
