A 20-year study of deep coral reefs off of the Hawaiian Islands has found "meadows" of algae 300 feet (90 meters) beneath the surface and the highest rates of species found nowhere else on Earth. Exploring mesophotic coral ecosystems is a challenge because scuba divers can barely reach their depths. Recreational divers don't get below 130 feet (40 m), and the reefs are too shallow for most submersible vehicles to operate there. So this show how difficult it is to reach these distinctive depths. This research group overcame this challenge by combining strategies. They used remote-sensing technology such as multibeam bathymetry mapping, which maps the seabed with sonar. They towed camera systems beneath boats and sent remotely operated cameras on solo undersea adventures. They also had divers wearing mixed-gas closed-circuit rebreathers swiming alongside submersibles. Source: Live Science Contributor Auther: Stephanie Pappas October 4, 2016 This new discovery is truly a huge advancement for for the scientific community, our bodies of water are not explored enough. Our scientific community is working to learn more about other planets, however has not even explored 10% of the oceans around the world. When the earth is roughly made up of 70% of water. This shows that the scientific community need to work more toward what they have on earth now. They were able to document the highest rates of endemism of any marine environment on Earth. The deeper the researchers dove, the more they found that they were in a one of kind world. At greater depths, more of the fish species they found were species that live only around Hawaii. Species that live in only one place on Earth this is endemic. The endemism rate at some deep reefs was 100 percent. This is a huge and unique discovery this need to be researched a lot more.
0 Comments
|
Vanessa Astorga-THS Archives
November 2016
Categories |