kevin z
Posts by this author
March 25, 2008
Life isn't always rosy for a top predator in the ocean. For there is always a predator that higher up the food chain trying to chase you down and make you its next meal! And that top-most of predators are humans. As we continue to overfish our seas, fish cannot reproduce fast enough to keep up…
March 23, 2008
The Scripps Institute of Oceanography and the Rady Business School of University of California, San Diego, have joined forces to create a degree program the world has never been witness to before! Nature Career's reports the new joint Oceanography PhD/MBA (Master of Business Administration)…
March 21, 2008
The following is a cartoon drawn by the boson of the R/V Ronald H. Brown.
March 21, 2008
Ed Yong over at Not Exactly Rocket Science ha an awesome post highlighting recent research on the unique vision of mantis shrimps. At the end of his post he (rightfully) dismisses the sea cucumber:
"Personally, I think mantis shrimps kick the crap out of sea cucumbers, but they're on a par with…
March 20, 2008
CNN reports:
"Although the vessels were once viewed as a quirky sideshow in the drug war, they are becoming faster, more seaworthy, and capable of carrying bigger loads of drugs than earlier models, according to those charged with catching them.
"They tend to be one of a kind," U.S. Coast Guard…
March 20, 2008
I think this graphic illustrates Craig's last Just One Thing Challenge.
Hat tip to Gear Junkie's Daily Dose blog via GT.
March 18, 2008
A blue whale from the eastern Pacific. According to the IUCN they are endangered. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
It amazes me that we can still in this day and era of satellites, technology and boats shipping goods everywhere that we can still find new populations of the world's largest living animal…
March 15, 2008
Did you actually make it through that?? Did you catch the strange reason why the sea is blue? Apparently the ocean is a mirror (not entirely false) that reflects the blue sky, hence it is blue (not entirely true). Some hypothesize that the ocean is blue because it reflects the blue sky, but this…
March 14, 2008
It is with great sadness I report the passing away of one of the world's greatest carcinologists, L.B. Holthuis. A carcinologist studies crustaceans and he contributed to the knowledge of many diverse types of crustaceans. A little about him from a Wikipedia entry:
"Holthuis was born in Probolingo…
March 8, 2008
Research and exploration into our deep oceans has resulted in a magnitude of benefits to society from medicinal compounds to improved navigation and mapping equipment. It is not often you hear about connections between the deep sea and sports though. TimesOnline UK reports:
British scientists…
March 8, 2008
I know I was supposed to be live blogging the conference, but there is just so much to do and see here the ASLO Ocean Sciences conference! Running from 9am to 7:30pm with 16 concurrent sessions and over 4000 participants this meeting was huge. So I am going to pick a few highlights from the meeting…
March 3, 2008
I'm reporting this week from the Ocean Sciences Meeting, the annual meeting of the American Society for Limnology and Oceanography (ASLO) and The Oceanographic Society (TOS). The first session I went to this morning was on Marine Predator hotspots. There were some interesting talks on…
March 1, 2008
These chicas are freaky. But if you lived on a whale vertebrae and eat through bone, perhaps you'd be a little on the kinky side too, right? Osedax, the "bone-devouring" worm is weird. Now, I know long time Deep Sea News readers will be a little used to us talking about odd critters in the ocean,…
March 1, 2008
CNN reports that Japan will meet with several International Whaling Commission members on Monday, preempting the meeting of the Commission by 3 days:
" Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the nation's fisheries agency will make their case to officials from Angola, Eritrea, Congo, Guinea, Ghana…
February 29, 2008
Picture copyright C. Fisher/Ridge2000
Brisingids look like crinoids, but they are actually sea stars, just kind of turned over. this particular beauty is Freyella sp. from near hydrothermal vents in the Lau Basin back-arc spreading center. They typically are on rock outcrop faces facing the current…
February 26, 2008
Thanks to Rick MacPherson, Program Director for the Coral Reef Alliance (and fin-tastic blogger!), for this shirt. We met a few weeks ago at the N.C. Science Blogging Conference where we co-moderated a session (along with Peter, Karen and Jason) on Real Time Blogging in the Marine Sciences. It was…
February 21, 2008
Rhizocephalan overlord,Peltogaster paguri (tubular thing sticking up on the right), infecting hermit crab. Photo courtesy of Jens Hoeg, used with permission.
Rhizocephala are curious creatures. They are actually in the Cirripedia, the group containing your friendly neighborhood penis-waving…
February 18, 2008
"Around the world, the oceans are in trouble, with declining fish stocks, disappearing coral reefs, and changing water chemistry."
Last Friday's Science Friday podcast was going live from the AAAS meeting in Boston featuring an amazing panel composed of Larry Crowder, Ben Halpern, Jane Lubchenco…
February 17, 2008
There a couple really cool pieces going around the intertubes recently. Basically, some people out there actually beat us to some stories but did such a great job I'd like to point you their way.
Grrlscientist at the blog Living the Scientific Life has an excellent post about the Oregon dead zone.…
February 16, 2008
Eminent marine biologist John Stuart Gray passed away last October, which I posted on at that time. He was a professor of marine biology at University of Oslo, Norway, studying the ecology of the meiobenthos and the effects of pollution on marine communities. The meiobenthos is the community of…
February 15, 2008
A coworker passed along 7 deep sea cartoons from the comic strip Sherman's Lagoon, who was gracious enough to grant us permission to use on our blog.
Sherman's Lagoon by Jim Toomey
© 2008 Jim Toomey. Used with permission from the artist.
February 15, 2008
Mind you, the shrimp is not technically "running" on the treadmill...
February 14, 2008
A coworker passed along 7 deep sea cartoons from the comic strip Sherman's Lagoon, who was gracious enough to grant us permission to use on our blog.
Sherman's Lagoon by Jim Toomey
© 2008 Jim Toomey. Used with permission from the artist.
February 14, 2008
Sometimes the sub just can't carry enough or you want to get more work done than you really have time to. Thats why some brilliant deep-sea scientist invented the elevator!
The yellow balls at the top are for floatation, which keeps the elevator neutrally bouyant. You can put all sorts of things…
February 13, 2008
A coworker passed along 7 deep sea cartoons from the comic strip Sherman's Lagoon, who was gracious enough to grant us permission to use on our blog.
Sherman's Lagoon by Jim Toomey
© 2008 Jim Toomey. Used with permission from the artist.
February 13, 2008
My birthday is coming up in a couple months (Aries baby!) and I just want to let Peter and Craig know what I want for my birthday. I'm not an unrealistic man. I won't go for say, the Proteus or anything. But I sure wouldn't mind one of the Human-Propelled Submarines being built by the mechanical…
February 12, 2008
A coworker passed along 7 deep sea cartoons from the comic strip Sherman's Lagoon, who was gracious enough to grant us permission to use on our blog.
Sherman's Lagoon by Jim Toomey
© 2008 Jim Toomey. Used with permission from the artist.
February 11, 2008
A coworker passed along 7 deep sea cartoons from the comic strip Sherman's Lagoon, who was gracious enough to grant us permission to use on our blog.
Sherman's Lagoon by Jim Toomey
© 2008 Jim Toomey. Used with permission from the artist.
February 11, 2008
CNN.com reports this morning on "Fried dolphin on menu in japanese town". I do not want to bear on the ethical issues of harvesting dolphins. Every culture has their animals they eat that other cultures are disgusted by, as stated in the article:
"Locals know they offend Western sensibilities by…
February 10, 2008
A coworker passed along 7 deep sea cartoons from the comic strip Sherman's Lagoon, who was gracious enough to grant us permission to use on our blog.
Sherman's Lagoon by Jim Toomey
© 2008 Jim Toomey. Used with permission from the artist.