cmcclain | December 13, 2007It's a questions that has plagued the life sciences for years. In the ultimate cage match to the death who would be the winner, a humungous squid or a sperm whale? Animal Face Off on the Discovery Science will tackle that question this Friday at 7:30 pm. Moreover, for your viewing pleasure the episode will be double the normal length. Even better the episode features squid expert extraordinaire Steve O'Shea vs. American whale scientist Scott Baker. My vote is obviously for the humungous squid and it appears that the chosen squid is the Colossal Squid. 500kgs and 12 meters in length with…
cmcclain | December 11, 2007
How large was the black octopus
That darkened the day's peace?
Were its branches made of iron
And its eyes, of dead fire?
And why did the tricolored whale
Cut me off on the road?
Chilean poet and communist politician Neftali Ricardo Reyes Basoalt, published this poem in The Book of Questions (translated by William O'Daly) under the penname Pablo Neruda. In 1971, Neruda was awarded the Nobel Prize, despite many of the committee members opposition to Neruda's previous praise of Stalinist dictatorship.
The illustration (black cut-out over hand-painted paper) is from Kristen Scribner from the…
cmcclain | December 11, 2007"Song of the Dredge", presented by Edward Forbes to the British Association at its annual meeting in 1839. Sung in the tune of Cream by Prince (kidding).
"Hurrah for the dredge, with its iron edge,
And its mystical triangle.
And its hided net with meshes set
Odd fishes to entangle!
The ship may move thro' the waves above,
'Mid scenes exciting wonder,
But braver sights the dredge delights
As it roves the waters under.
Chorus:
Then a-dredging we will go wise boys
A-dredging we will go!
A-dredging we will go, a-dredging we will go,
A-dredging we will go, wise boys,
A-dredging we will go!
Down in…
cmcclain | December 11, 2007I am currently reading Descent, the story of the Bathysphere, Beebe, and Barton. Conversing with Christina Kellogg during a recent trip and the book forced my thoughts to the technological, and often psychological feats, already accomplished and those that will continue to challenge us in order to explore the deep seafloor. Because of safety, finances, logistics, and a variety of other practical reasons many institutes have justifiably turned to ROV's (remote operated vehicles) instead of manned exploration. Perhaps this makes sense as much as turning the space programmed to unmanned…
cmcclain | December 10, 2007In case you've been living in a hole that doesn't have internet access, something is brewing on the internet.
A CALL FOR A PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE ON SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
Given the many urgent scientific and technological challenges facing America and the rest of the world, the increasing need for accurate scientific information in political decision making, and the vital role scientific innovation plays in spurring economic growth and competitiveness, we, the undersigned, call for a public debate in which the U.S. presidential candidates share their views on the issues of The Environment,…
cmcclain | December 9, 2007NEPTUNE is more than just a planet...a clever acronym for the North-East Pacific Time-Series Undersea Networked Experiments. The U.S. Canadian venture is series of cable-linked seafloor observatories, purported to be the world's largest. The project will lay 3,000 km of powered fibre optic cable over a 200,000 sq km region in the northeast Pacific. The network will contain several scientific nodes that can be controlled and monitored from land. There are four major research themes including: the structure and seismic behaviour of the ocean crust, seabed chemistry and geology, ocean climate…
cmcclain | December 7, 2007
Image credit: Image: (c) 2002 MBARI / NOAA. Red octopus (Benthoctopus sp.) hunting on Davidson Seamount. Deep-water octopus often hunt snails, crabs, and other small animals on the seafloor.
cmcclain | December 6, 2007
An underwater restroom built into the side of an aquarium located at a cafe in Akashi, Japa
petnoyer | December 5, 2007
This is a funny story about a recent expedition to Saba Bank in the Netherlands Antilles. I've been engaged in a few of these over the last couple years, and each trip was funny in its own right. For instance the time we rode four hours each way in 12 foot seas to survey a barren sandy piece seafloor we couldn't reach (~125'). That was bad. I hovered 40 minutes with a whiteboard squinting at coralllimorphs 20 feet below in an unintended "blue dive". If you missed past postings on Saba you can find them here and here.
The latest dive expedition was funny because our unofficial job was to help…
cmcclain | December 5, 2007
As this holiday seasons quickly approaches, I am left pondering what I would like to appear under the tree.
1. The search for a tenure-track faculty position continues. It could be going much better. A nice juicy job offer or even an interview would be fantastic.
2. The most vital piece of science gear I have, my ipod (now several generations old), just quit. My travel, expeditions, and lab work now continue without a soundtrack of block-rockin beats. So a new ipod would be great. However, given #1, #2 is not likely to happen.
3. I have a bit of a science crush on Sylvia Earle. Who…
cmcclain | December 5, 2007A little something to get you past the mid-week hump.
CLICK the play button. Then CLICK and DRAG on the video screen to pan across the 360° view.
Embed this video in your blog
CLICK the play button. Then CLICK and DRAG on the video screen to pan across the 360° view.
Embed this video in your blog
cmcclain | December 5, 2007There is a nice write up in Nature about the ARGO (Array for Real-time Geostrophic Oceanography). Argo is network of automonous floats, now numbering over 3000, that record temperature and salinity in the upper 2,000m of the water column. ARGO has greatly increased our knowledge of these factors that were based before on measurements from research vessels and merchant ships. Obviously, this restricts where the data come from and yields poor coverage for many avoided or ignored areas.
petnoyer | December 3, 2007 This month's Carnival of the Blue is happening now at The Natural Patriot. The quality and layout have improved remarkably over time, due largely to the efforts of past Carnival hosts. This is also one of the better moderated collections so far. Host Emmett Duffy does a great job providing a few words of background on each of the eighteen ocean stories hosted there.
The Carnival sideshows include musings on sharks, seagrass, snapping shrimp, Cyclone Sidr, and the Carbon Tax, as well as a profile of the "modern pirate" at the helm of the Sea Shepard, interesting talk about a jellyfish diet,…
cmcclain | December 3, 2007Photo from the Cephalopod PageThe reason I ask is the Giant Australian Cuttlefish, the world's largest cuttlefish at 23lbs and near 4-5 ft long, may be facing a tougher future. Giant Australian Cuttlefish, Sepia apama, are confined to southern Australia between depths of 0m-100m. One of the largest breeding grounds for this species is Port Bonython which is being targeted by the mining industry for large deep-sea port to ship out billions of dollars of uranium, copper, gold and other minerals.
The state's Chamber of Mines and Energy is lobbying Premier Mike Rann and senior ministers to…
cmcclain | December 2, 2007The ends of Permian and Triassic periods were a very bad time for marine invertebrates. Suffering, starvations, watching loved ones die...very hard times indeed. A whole spectrum of hypotheses is out there to account for mass extinctions including giant asteroid impacts, major shifts in oceanographic conditions, and various climatic changes. A new paper by Powers and Bottjer in Geology examining an unusual animal group may shed some light on what occurred. The authors collect data on Bryozoans, a group still occurring today with 5,000 species, of the early Permian to the Late Triassic.…
cmcclain | December 2, 2007OCEANA Europe is not pleased with European Commission's proposals for 2008 shark quotas for Total Allowable Catches (TACs). Two of the species included in the proposal are both considered Critically Endangered in the North East Atlantic by the IUCN and thus Zero TAC's are needed. For the spurdog (Squalus acanthias) the EC recommends a 25% decrease from last year but the 2,752 ton catch limit is still far above the scientific recommendations for these species. Much of the problem centers on deep-sea sharks which are particularly susceptible to overfishing due to their late maturity, slow…
cmcclain | November 29, 2007
Look familiar? Some of you may remember that Wes Anderson parodied this in the Life Aquatic.
petnoyer | November 29, 2007
No overdue paper on deep water formation in the western North Atlantic for last semester's PhysO class is gonna stop us from having a little fun on Thanksgiving day. In about one week there should be a Christmas tree behind us. That's Maria and Ana on the right. Clara and me on the left. Clara turned two a week ago. Happy holidays from the family.
Here in Texas we eat tamales from Christmas. Like on Mars.
They do the same thing there...
Man, I hope it snows. Good luck with final exams, everybody.
cmcclain | November 29, 2007 A mosaic of Monterey Bay from photos I took two weekends ago on the steam back to Moss Landing. Click on the image for the full size (warning: large file size)
cmcclain | November 28, 2007
Yes, it is! A cephalopod cookie cutter and helping to protect the oceans for just $35...that's a slice of fried gold. This holiday season, Oceana is providing a unique cookie cutters to keep for yourself or give to loved ones as incentive to help protect the oceans. Supporters can virtually adopt a marine creature (Clam, Crab, Octopus, Seahorse, Penguin, Polar Bear, Seal, Snowflake*, Dolphin, Shark, Turtle, Whale, Oceana Ranger*, Salmon, Seagull and Starfish), recipients can receive up to 16 ocean themed cookie cutters, an official adoption certificate, ocean facts and a special sugar…