I'm thrilled that with a relatively small amount of funding, we can start to answer questions about it that may be vital to changing how we live." "It's of enormous importance for our future, and the future of our world. "The ocean always has been my passion, in many respects," Happel says. "He's concerned about all the changes we're seeing in the marine environment, and he wants to fund work that enables people to make better decisions about the ocean." ![]() "I think what's really exciting about Otto is his deep appreciation, understanding, and curiosity about the science, the engineering-and how they inform ocean policy," Abbott says. Abbott helped champion the project during his tenure, enlisting the help of German philanthropist Otto Happel, whose interest in WHOI's twilight zone research led to a generous gift from the Happel Foundation. ![]() Working with WHOI marine chemist Ken Buesseler, Omand plans to deploy a fleet of 20 MINIONS in the network.įormer WHOI President and Director Mark Abbott says it would be challenging to fund such a large-scale, long-term observation network through federal sources. Each MINION will be equipped with the same novel tracking technology as Thorrold's fish, recording its position as it images carbon-rich particles sinking to deeper waters. University of Rhode Island physical oceanographer Melissa Omand will be taking an even closer look at carbon in the twilight zone-through the cameras of small floating robots known as MINIONS. (Photo by Paul Caiger, © Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution). "What happens when you're in or out of the Gulf Stream? Does it impact the biomass of organisms that are migrating? Does it impact their speed? All of these questions are important to the carbon cycle."Īt only a few inches in length, the black dragonfish (Idiacanthidae) is still a ferocious predator in the Ocean Twilight Zone, using its dangling lure and ensnaring teeth to trap prey looming in the dimly lit water. "We're hoping to get a much better understanding of the migration and how it changes over time-with the seasons, with water temperature, and with the currents," Lavery says. ![]() “I’m thrilled that with a relatively small amount of funding, we can start to answer questions that may be vital to changing how we live.” It will really advance our understanding of their capabilities to track carbon through the twilight zone." "We could put the MINIONS out for six months, or even up to a year. "This is the perfect opportunity to do a long-term test of our new technology," Omand says. Their movements fast-track atmospheric carbon from surface waters to the deep ocean, helping to regulate global climate. That mooring is being developed by WHOI acoustic oceanographer Andone Lavery, who is particularly interested in what its sonar will reveal about the largest migration on the planet-the nightly journey of twilight zone species to and from the surface to feed. ![]() "Then after a year or so, the tag pops off the fish and floats to the surface, and all those geolocation data are relayed back to us by satellite," Thorrold says.Īnother major component of the network-a central mooring equipped with active sonars-will complement the predator tracking data with information about the location and abundance of their prey: the small fish found in huge numbers throughout the twilight zone. And, they work underwater, where GPS can't. By recording how long it takes sound from different sources to reach the fish, the tags can track their location in three dimensions. Sound sources anchored at the network's four corners will send out acoustic signals that can be "heard" by tiny receivers in tags attached to bigeye tuna and swordfish, two commercially important species known to dive into the twilight zone for prey. "This is really the first time that anyone has developed a system capable of collecting data with that kind of spatial and temporal resolution, specifically in the ocean's midwater," says WHOI ocean ecologist Simon Thorrold, who is helping to create the network. (Photo by Paul Caiger, © Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) Above: A free-swimming sea snail known as a sea angel flaps its winglike arms gracefully while in search of food, while another species (Diacria trispinosa, below) propels itself through the Ocean Twilight Zone with its tiny feet.
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