A new paper by MBARI researchers shows that filter-feeding animals called giant larvaceans can collect and consume microplastic particles, potentially carrying microplastics to the deep seafloor.

Sound may be weightless, but echosounders aren’t. To study Monterey Bay’s ecology, Scientist Kelly Benoit-Bird uses an echosounder with five different transducers, weighing about 165 pounds.

Guests sometimes join MBARI expeditions, but a special kind of visitor dropped in on a recent research cruise.

The institute opened its doors to the public, providing visitors with a once-a-year opportunity to talk with scientists, engineers, and marine operations crews about their work.

MBARI's Environmental Sample Processors (ESPs), originally designed to study toxic algal blooms in the ocean, are now being used to protect municipal drinking-water supplies.

Despite their close proximity, two recently discovered hydrothermal vent fields in the Gulf of California host very different animal communities. This finding contradicts a common scientific assumption that neighboring vents will share similar animal communities.

Throughout the world ocean, animals congregate at certain depths. A new paper in Limnology and Oceanography shows that, rather than consisting of a random mixture of animals, these deep-scattering layers contain discrete groups of squids, fishes, and crustaceans.

In the spring of 2015, Monterey Bay experienced one of the most toxic algal blooms ever. A new paper shows that this bloom became particularly toxic because of an unusually low ratio of silicate to nitrate in Bay Waters.

David Needham Today Co-Chief Scientists Sebastian Sudek and Charmaine Yung directed the ROV Doc Ricketts to observe and collect deep-sea benthic invertebrates, such as sponges and corals, at the Davidson Seamount so we can study their microbiomes. Today we also accomplished the deepest deployment ever of the in situ ultraviolet spectrophotometer (ISUS), a sensor developed …

David Needham One of our goals today was to find and sample a large phytoplankton bloom to study phytoplankton and bacterial associations. Although blooms often occur in the spring, they can be hard to predict, and the ocean doesn’t give its secrets away easily! Fortunately, we identified a large bloom using observations from satellite chlorophyll …

David Needham The first day and a half of our cruise was busy and exciting. After an initial delay of six hours due to rough seas and strong winds, we had a successful deployment of the ROV Doc Ricketts aboard the R/V Western Flyer. With the help of the robotic arms of the ROV and the …

An acidic ocean has been shown to affect many species, but the impacts on entire communities are more complicated.

MBARI’s newly printed 2016 Annual Report is filled with ocean-research adventures and discoveries. It is available now as a PDF file on MBARI’s website.

The importance of eDNA Meilina Dalit Today we repeated yesterday’s activities of coordinating simultaneous sampling from the R/V Western Flyer (CTD casts), the Reuben Lasker (midwater trawls), and LRAUV Aku (Environmental Sample Processor sampling). While LRAUV Aku is autonomously collecting samples with a third-generation Environmental Sample Processor (ESP), Research Specialist Kevan Yamahara is also archiving …

New partnerships and technologies add an exciting new dimension to MBARI's 2017 CANON experiment.

Meeting the Reuben Lasker Meilina Dalit This is an expedition with many moving parts, and today we added the R/V Reuben Lasker, a NOAA ship, into the mix. We rendezvoused with the ship at an offshore upwelling front (the boundary between cold, nutrient-rich upwelled water and warmer offshore water) that was identified by our fleet …

New laser technology is allowing MBARI scientists to look into the structure of giant larvaceans--tadpole-like marine animals that are important players in ocean ecosystems.

Using sound to locate prey Meilina Dalit Despite the early call time of 4:30 a.m., spirits were pleasant the morning of the first day of the expedition. With a great weather forecast for the next couple of days, there was little to complain about other than wishing for another hour of sleep. The R/V Western …

In the first quantitative analysis of deep-sea bioluminescence, MBARI researchers Séverine Martini and Steve Haddock show that three quarters of the animals in Monterey Bay from the surface down to 4,000 meters deep can produce their own light.

MBARI’s M1 mooring is an important data collection station that floats above the seafloor in Monterey Bay continuously taking a variety of measurements to give researchers a clear picture of oceanographic conditions.