tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-64109386108136704832024-03-17T23:00:06.588-04:00Meyer-Kaiser labResearching larval dispersal and seafloor communities from the tropics to the polesKirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.comBlogger933125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-6811158151100818162024-03-15T16:19:00.005-04:002024-03-15T16:19:49.783-04:00I have a sword<div style="text-align: left;">I had a pretty entertaining conversation with Calvin this morning. We were commiserating about a particularly complex proposal. The thing is nasty. It has sub-awards, it has in-kind, it has cost-sharing, it has about 15 different partners. Calvin described it as a menacing, slimy, Hydra monster of a proposal. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I shrugged. "Whatever; I have a sword." </div><div style="text-align: left;">Calvin laughed out loud. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhplocQzUqMJG6SZNEelVlkIQdH1wzE8dKCLpbmr5eDX132mX0cszlJn3D4e97kWixloq3ZAbt0dmjb1e9KS7KTGrIhnuiEsY8LBcU6CbtDqFcUSUpldujIzdTxx6bIL25N_vJUJXonQJpGIxbjs_yN7oH4V-ozCUmdMnN66dfo7lknka9QIT4Q7Wf3pNqM" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="358" data-original-width="351" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhplocQzUqMJG6SZNEelVlkIQdH1wzE8dKCLpbmr5eDX132mX0cszlJn3D4e97kWixloq3ZAbt0dmjb1e9KS7KTGrIhnuiEsY8LBcU6CbtDqFcUSUpldujIzdTxx6bIL25N_vJUJXonQJpGIxbjs_yN7oH4V-ozCUmdMnN66dfo7lknka9QIT4Q7Wf3pNqM" width="235" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Photogrammetric model of a fishing net on<br />the <i>Portland</i> bow. Credit: Marine Imaging <br />Technologies. </span></td></tr></tbody></table>For all the times I've prided myself on playing <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2016/07/sword-and-shield.html" target="_blank">scientific defense</a>, not offence, I must admit there are times when I need a sword - or at least an offensive strategy. How do you get ahead of a problem? How do you slay a 3-headed monster? </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">The proposal itself is actually the closest I'll ever come to playing offence: prevention. We're proposing to partner with stakeholders across Massachusetts to prevent future entanglements of fishing gear on shipwrecks. You know what I'm talking about - my team discovered in 2019-2020 that trawl nets and monofilament had become entangled on <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2019/07/the-palmer-and-crary.html" target="_blank">multiple historic shipwrecks</a> in Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary. It's tragic for a fisherman to lose an expensive net. What's more, that net can <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/11/historiography.html" target="_blank">damage the physical structure</a> of the shipwreck it got snagged on, and it can <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/05/maritime-heritage-ecology-part-2.html" target="_blank">even alter</a> the <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2019/12/film-festival.html" target="_blank">biological community</a> living on the shipwreck. <br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Our partners at the sanctuary have already started <a href="https://hakaimagazine.com/features/loose-lips-save-sunken-ships/" target="_blank">taking steps</a> to reduce fishing impacts on shipwrecks, but we can do more. By bringing all relevant stakeholders to the table and engaging the fishing community as experts, we're hoping to identify tractable solutions with broad support and protect our underwater cultural heritage. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">This proposal is a new experience for me. It's the first time my research has identified a problem, and then I've taken concrete steps to try and fix it. I'm learning a lot as I go. For all the complexities and headache this particular proposal brought me, I am proud of our work. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">And when it comes to cutting nets off of shipwrecks - hey, I have a sword. </div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-84144169491502581542024-03-15T15:57:00.000-04:002024-03-15T15:57:23.730-04:00Hairy beast<div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1KeikX07n1_eHRtixvT87ivhnEKuLRM3CIui0-38FaOeEEek60lLHrOxbI116W1KhBnEQCANAVMYwOfz6fzPU3wZOrTNrkqyhhHvPInsNmsxWYDRASCB8_HZDHhnd_NUF_m7b1lMZsJTqm63P5ugkKkj50AbhG3zoYbnsOOdXEDtQIW2GFEy0wLTpEPGm/s3409/Fig2_Example.tif" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2227" data-original-width="3409" height="261" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1KeikX07n1_eHRtixvT87ivhnEKuLRM3CIui0-38FaOeEEek60lLHrOxbI116W1KhBnEQCANAVMYwOfz6fzPU3wZOrTNrkqyhhHvPInsNmsxWYDRASCB8_HZDHhnd_NUF_m7b1lMZsJTqm63P5ugkKkj50AbhG3zoYbnsOOdXEDtQIW2GFEy0wLTpEPGm/w400-h261/Fig2_Example.tif" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Some of the common coral genera in our study</span></td></tr></tbody></table>"Every project starts out a hairy beast."</div><div style="text-align: left;">- I wrote this in a text to a friend today <br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">It is a sunny Friday in Woods Hole, and I am feeling victorious. Recently, I've been working on a paper about recruitment dynamics of corals in Palau. You know - the project that had me <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/05/satisfied.html" target="_blank">so obsessed</a> with finding juvenile corals for 5 years. I had such a hard time getting baby corals to settle on tiles that I gave up and started looking for them on the reef. Turns out <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/05/satisfied-part-2.html" target="_blank">my camera</a> was a much more effective tool for finding small juveniles than the tiles I had tried. Over the course of 3 years, my team collected <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/04/satisfied-part-3.html" target="_blank">thousands of images</a>. Every single one of them had to <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/01/coral-taxonomy.html" target="_blank">be identified</a> <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/02/those-bright-bands.html" target="_blank">to at least genus</a>. The project was one giant, hairy beast. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">When I finally took a look at the final data, it was <i>messy</i>. There were significant differences all over that dataset - between adults and juveniles, between juveniles in the photos and recruits on the tiles, between inner and outer sites, between sites in the north, middle, and south of our study area. Normally, scientists beg their data to show something, anything that's statistically significant. I had the opposite problem - everything was different from everything else. How in the world am I supposed to interpret those results? </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">My first draft of the manuscript was just as messy as the data. I had no idea what I could even conclude from our study. I sent it around to the team asking for feedback - and I'm so glad I did.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Matthew left a comment in the margin of my draft, flagging one result in particular. "Hm, I interpret this completely differently" he had written. Cas had actually responded with his own comment - and yet another alternate interpretation. For starters, it's probably worth highlighting that three well-informed, competent, professional scientists looked at the same result and came to three different conclusions. More important, though, is what those comments led to. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">It forced me to nail down a framework. I made a chart in my notebook: if A, then X; if B, then Y. It was what the project needed all along. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">We hypothesized that corals would experience high mortality shortly after settling down to the seafloor - after all, most invertebrates do. That mortality could shape the composition of the coral community at different reefs. Basically, things settle on the seafloor, and as the corals that can't live in the place they settled die off, the communities come to look different. If our hypothesis is true, then we would see a high diversity of coral recruits (the ones that have just settled on tiles) and no differences between sites. As they grow, some die off, so we expect lower diversity of coral juveniles (the slightly larger ones we photographed) and maybe some differences between sites. Then we expect the lowest diversity for adults and strong differences between sites. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Did our hypothesis turn out to be true? Well, I don't want to spoil the paper, so stay tuned. In the meantime, I'm incredibly grateful for my <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/04/and-then-there-were-five.html" target="_blank">team of collaborators</a>. My hairy beast of a project has turned into a docile creature. Thank goodness.</div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-74242623413214947712024-03-06T17:02:00.000-05:002024-03-06T17:02:01.305-05:001.5 perfect days<div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaonFI4SVAzxPgCuHfi5xLYh50S3x2-nW963oqzoA_bxeOgmvR4V-26V_c3WLu2zjYnI2vTREmDc3qn7JKIvx-eJqlP9tXOd2Un31xQkFs-NkYIxywyxr5mJgIaZx-Wjy7Zd2s9YE_7Yzancp0hc8WFelqLmnJIQ5RNf0ZTCe3-E9_azL7cCFffAuoOLXc/s800/IMG_3663.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="800" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaonFI4SVAzxPgCuHfi5xLYh50S3x2-nW963oqzoA_bxeOgmvR4V-26V_c3WLu2zjYnI2vTREmDc3qn7JKIvx-eJqlP9tXOd2Un31xQkFs-NkYIxywyxr5mJgIaZx-Wjy7Zd2s9YE_7Yzancp0hc8WFelqLmnJIQ5RNf0ZTCe3-E9_azL7cCFffAuoOLXc/s320/IMG_3663.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Beignets at Cafe du Monde!</span></td></tr></tbody></table>You know those "Three Perfect Days" ads they have on airplanes? They play on the little screens in the seat backs while you're boarding. Every one starts with scenery of a beautiful destination that the airline serves, followed by suggestions for what to do while you're there. There are exactly three suggestions, corresponding to three days on the ground. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I have the same thought about every "Three Perfect Days" ad: that's not enough to do for three days. You could do every suggested activity in a single day. Maybe a day and a half.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I tell you what, friends, if there was ever a travel planner who agreed with me, her name is Betsy. She is my husband's cousin, and she lives with her family in Louisiana. As soon as Ocean Sciences ended, I switched into Aunt Mode (I guess technically First-Cousin-By-Marriage Mode) and spent the weekend with Betsy's family. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">It was 1.5 <i>perfect</i> days. We met for dinner. We went to the aquarium. We explored the new insectarium (that's like an aquarium but with insects). We did an escape room. We ate beignets. It was busy and jam-packed and absolutely perfect. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7FsVZo71Fq80MhNXjyoz_8tgv9uor4n60tiR7KJC0jd53o8ajvNrWE24ur_jhBBeANlqAjzJZSTKUKWtBK_zqsiYAFyOa4899i38Agvwvhpx3goIzyqytNHnzVzqrrap-nnGhcUq8lE_xEDO45eGJtkauOg6XX5IWjAZnI-ngHF7P5Hf88QQkDF76QL0w/s640/IMG_3661.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="480" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7FsVZo71Fq80MhNXjyoz_8tgv9uor4n60tiR7KJC0jd53o8ajvNrWE24ur_jhBBeANlqAjzJZSTKUKWtBK_zqsiYAFyOa4899i38Agvwvhpx3goIzyqytNHnzVzqrrap-nnGhcUq8lE_xEDO45eGJtkauOg6XX5IWjAZnI-ngHF7P5Hf88QQkDF76QL0w/s320/IMG_3661.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>You see, Betsy and her husband, Zac, have two kids. The oldest, Everly, wants to be a scientist. Back when <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2018/12/sunset.html" target="_blank">Carl and I got married</a>, Betsy reached out through the extended family grapevine to ask if I would want to be pen pals with her daughter, and you can bet I said yes. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I absolutely adore Everly. She is ridiculously intelligent, insatiably curious, and surprisingly articulate for an 11-year-old. I tell her about the research projects I'm doing; she tells me about her robotics team. I send her postcards from <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/01/orientation-day.html" target="_blank">Svalbard</a> and <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/04/quirks-of-life-in-palau.html" target="_blank">Palau</a>. She sends me artwork that hangs in my kitchen. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Everly and I have been trading letters for years, so our first in-person meeting was a pretty big deal to both of us. Betsy's younger daughter, Lelia, was equally enthusiastic to meet me. I ended up sitting between the two girls at every meal, holding each of their hands on Canal Street, making sure they both got to talk to me as we strolled through the aquarium. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2015/10/et-hjem.html" target="_blank">Kids are the best</a>. I love teaching them about science, listening to what they have to say, and hopefully helping them shape healthy habits and good goals for the future. Betsy, Zach, Everly, Lelia, I had an amazing time with you in New Orleans and am already looking forward to the next time we see each other. </div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-11272232559837965062024-03-01T15:27:00.000-05:002024-03-01T15:27:36.424-05:00Ocean Sciences: part 2<div style="text-align: left;">Probably the most exciting part of my week at Ocean Sciences was getting invited to a press event. The American Geophysical Union, the ginormous professional society behind Ocean Sciences, organizes these roundtable discussions between certain scientists and reporters at every conference. Each scientist gets a few minutes to explain their research, and then the floor opens for anyone to ask questions. Usually, the moderator is the one who asks the most questions, but the goal is to keep the conversation flowing. The roundtables are recorded and posted online so anyone can watch them later. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgBBLvbZ7arQJBY-uGndtbKSurGgiBWEqlfE2kTRtDjnqhb1XzMjSRZTnEtWNB0MuGGxQBSKMsv-1RYL5fDdxLCfC2b_wEj3hqk6bN9vraL3q-FDkZN5n5WnQWDBPvfhlTXpJvOL1rdoJkA-1HKx5vz8McwsN8LaRsTNyRC9vhuZif9YODDvXFRXqFo_q_A" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgBBLvbZ7arQJBY-uGndtbKSurGgiBWEqlfE2kTRtDjnqhb1XzMjSRZTnEtWNB0MuGGxQBSKMsv-1RYL5fDdxLCfC2b_wEj3hqk6bN9vraL3q-FDkZN5n5WnQWDBPvfhlTXpJvOL1rdoJkA-1HKx5vz8McwsN8LaRsTNyRC9vhuZif9YODDvXFRXqFo_q_A" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">A screenshot from the roundtable recording - here, I'm talking<br />about a recent project in the Gulf of Mexico.</span></td></tr></tbody></table>In addition to yours truly, panelists in my roundtable included Melanie Damor, an archaeologist with the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, and Nathan Figueredo, a student at Louisiana State University. Our research was very complementary, so it turned into a great discussion.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">If you're interested in seeing the roundtable, you can watch it here: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwCLClH-bEs">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwCLClH-bEs</a></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">If you're a journalist interested in talking about shipwrecks or the things that live on them, shoot me a message at <b>kmeyer@whoi.edu</b>. </div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-29059968752053714302024-02-24T09:32:00.001-05:002024-02-26T09:39:27.008-05:00Ocean Sciences<div style="text-align: left;">"You should go to Ocean Sciences"<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMpU6wT3_qkheZ3qX7Z1bpwlCoLFFm30jycDPqTC7eKL_Sk30Ck5I1wfMRZnu5PTeapLUA5hhF26JUUAYRimrFcldWN_ZzwRMQeLncFcwiQaGx8N12-vlf7GzFyHoAgus-mrw3t1sr09cSEQcbfz7ODTdRpv54xvMEdLISsXFASBhUvla2Hp1Wc3ESIckK/s2048/IMG_4432.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMpU6wT3_qkheZ3qX7Z1bpwlCoLFFm30jycDPqTC7eKL_Sk30Ck5I1wfMRZnu5PTeapLUA5hhF26JUUAYRimrFcldWN_ZzwRMQeLncFcwiQaGx8N12-vlf7GzFyHoAgus-mrw3t1sr09cSEQcbfz7ODTdRpv54xvMEdLISsXFASBhUvla2Hp1Wc3ESIckK/s320/IMG_4432.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Giving my presentation. Photo by Johanna Weston.</span></td></tr></tbody></table></div><div style="text-align: left;">- my mentoring committee, every time we've met over the last 4 years</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I'm a small town girl. I don't do crowds. So when my mentoring committee pushed me to present at a conference with 5,000 participants, I pushed back. Not my speed, I told them. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Here's the thing: Ocean Sciences is a hub. It's not just other scientists who show up here; program officers from all the major funding agencies show up. Reporters. Publishers. People who I would be lucky to connect with. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">So I came. I navigated the crowd. I gave my presentation - and guess what, I even got invited to participate in a press event. I attended town hall meetings with some of the major funding agencies. I connected with potential new colleagues, and I ran into multiple people who I hadn't seen in years. Yes, mentoring committee, you were right. I'm glad I came. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqD-rvMH9zrOFSgTMAjhNRd_KErtRK6HyuZRyLYxVptwswCzBQBbbKL4GtIYiD6gnotXJQXT0CyO-Au6yHAbvb_4EJEvR1BFa24kQqnLzEnU88NY3RugalJgCvXjv45A3Rocxp9cYbzwgtUyBpAbt00OMy91PQ6jcb71YasR1Bi1ZyJQ8IsPJnofBLSEc-/s2048/IMG_3646.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqD-rvMH9zrOFSgTMAjhNRd_KErtRK6HyuZRyLYxVptwswCzBQBbbKL4GtIYiD6gnotXJQXT0CyO-Au6yHAbvb_4EJEvR1BFa24kQqnLzEnU88NY3RugalJgCvXjv45A3Rocxp9cYbzwgtUyBpAbt00OMy91PQ6jcb71YasR1Bi1ZyJQ8IsPJnofBLSEc-/s320/IMG_3646.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">WHOI students and faculty at the Audubon Aquarium.</span></td></tr></tbody></table><br /></div>There were several highlights this week, but one in particular that comes to mind was a reception for WHOI employees and alumni at the Audubon Aquarium here in New Orleans. We sipped wine and munched on hors d'oeuvres next to tanks of fish and sharks. There was even a tunnel you could walk through with fish overhead. There was shrimp in a cream sauce over cheese grits. It was the best New Orleans has to offer.<div><br /></div><div>It's been a full but productive week - clearly worth the trip. <br /></div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-45669452680559992722024-02-13T12:51:00.002-05:002024-02-13T12:51:36.612-05:00Cryptic.<div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivUFOOy_dkXCiJ6z-JLewE7i3igoWlA8dhR78WV8jYMcQMOpsUOzDToV9Jz5AmBqVuqXDt8_N8wDqs7evXUDGSKT4SrhbYHEOhyphenhypheny9HCAKi91rQKqZFPK8MHVbmnLKv813bDgvaTKkZdryXLQyYevofVtIRVM9nPsW9drLo25vD5uKdf3yuhyyDQslwW2EK/s2048/IMG_3619.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1536" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivUFOOy_dkXCiJ6z-JLewE7i3igoWlA8dhR78WV8jYMcQMOpsUOzDToV9Jz5AmBqVuqXDt8_N8wDqs7evXUDGSKT4SrhbYHEOhyphenhypheny9HCAKi91rQKqZFPK8MHVbmnLKv813bDgvaTKkZdryXLQyYevofVtIRVM9nPsW9drLo25vD5uKdf3yuhyyDQslwW2EK/s320/IMG_3619.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">My work station for the day (WHOI is closed<br />for inclement weather).</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Right now, I am sitting cross-legged on a semi-circular orange armchair. Dark wood panels sandwich me on two walls, while the other two hold large glass windows to the outside world. It's getting white out there. Fat, wet flakes of snow started falling a few hours ago, and it shows no sign of stopping. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">To my right, a four-log fire provides cozy, comforting heat to the dark-paneled den. My husband clacks on a keyboard behind me, and to my left, our overgrown floof of a dog naps on the floor. It is winter in New England. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">If you asked me about coral reefs right now, I might not even know what you're talking about. As far as I'm concerned, the world is white and cold, like the ice planet Hoth. All I want in the world is my family and this fire. What are the tropics? From my orange armchair, the hot, humid latitudes feel a galaxy away. <br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Nevertheless, I was roused from my cozy winter stupor by an email today. A paper that I had contributed to about cryptic lineages in corals was published online! If you've never heard the term "cryptic lineage" before, think about a large family - all the individuals are closely related, in fact much more closely related to one another than members of other families. They might have distinct facial features, but otherwise, they look like perfectly normal people. Cryptic lineages are genetically distinct groups of corals. They look like the same species - even I can't tell them apart - but when you check out their DNA, you'll notice they <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/12/palau-paper-number-one.html" target="_blank">cluster into distinct groups</a>. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">What's cool about coral cryptic lineages is that in most cases, different lineages are good at different things. Some can tolerate high temperatures really well; some thrive in turbid waters or at high latitudes; still others work well at depth. Different lineages within a species can survive in different conditions - and that bodes pretty well for the future of coral reefs. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/02/team-porites.html" target="_blank">Cas was so</a> inspired by our work on <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/04/the-stud.html" target="_blank">cryptic lineages</a> of <i>Porites lobata</i> in Palau that he decided to dig into the literature and figure out how wide-spread cryptic lineages were in corals in general. Turns out, they're everywhere. There's a study published about cryptic lineages in almost every genus of corals on the planet. Understanding how cryptic lineages work is really important for coral conservation in a changing climate. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I was glad to contribute to this important perspective paper and help advance scientific thought about cryptic lineages in corals. You can <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-023-02319-y.epdf?sharing_token=bqdo0NndPCa8T0sii-wwltRgN0jAjWel9jnR3ZoTv0Prqo7B_wli11KLCH2BOi-FIqK0JTy_e8IsNuGPbs2GnGfgDb2ReAi1sgck91JqWWXbFedztgGNKeY151xSzNvu9SwBqVZ-bVq38tGKQSURPPAqGphCAUfE3fDBFiJ08AQ%3D" target="_blank">read the paper here</a> in <i>Nature Ecology and Evolution</i>. </div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-10739783996857110472024-02-08T17:35:00.003-05:002024-02-08T17:35:50.957-05:00Alvin, Please Deploy My Trap There<div style="text-align: left;">Guest blog post by postdoc Johanna Weston</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="text-align: justify;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="text-align: justify;">Today, I am coming to you from
the Central East Pacific near 9°50’ North. I am </span><span style="text-align: justify;">on board R/V <i>Atlantis</i></span><span style="text-align: justify;"> along the East Pacific Rise as part of an NSF-funded cruise to study the biodiversity of
inactive sulfide vents. Or, as we are saying – Life After Vents.</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">The <span lang="EN-GB" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">East Pacific Rise (EPR) is a mid-ocean rise at
a divergent tectonic plate boundary</span> and a fast-spreading <span lang="EN-GB" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">mid-ocean ridge</span>. Along this
axis, there is a lot of hydrothermal venting activity. <span lang="EN-GB" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">However, this venting is ultimately transient,
leaving only the sulfide</span><span lang="EN-GB"> </span><span lang="EN-GB" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">mineral-rich deposits after the fluid flow
stops.</span> These inactive sulfides are beautiful and distinct features on
the seafloor. They aren't teeming with the iconic life present on active vents,
but they are not devoid of life either. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">I spent January and February on a
team, led by Dr. Lauren Mullineaux from WHOI and Dr. Jason Sylvan from Texas A&M,
exploring some inactive sulfides. We are using the human-occupied submersible
(HOV) <i><a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2015/07/4804.html" target="_blank">Alvin</a></i> to image, collect animals living on the rocks, and retrieve rocks!
This is my first experience working with <i><a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2015/07/4804-part-2.html" target="_blank">Alvin</a></i> or a vehicle with manipulator arms.
From planning sample collection, sorting samples, diving in <i><a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2015/07/4804-part-3.html" target="_blank">Alvin</a></i>, and seeing
the deep ocean with my own eyee, this experience has been formative as a deep-ocean
scientist. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">One element that has transformed
my thinking is the ability to choose where and when samples are collected. This
concept is novel because my PhD focused on the ocean's deepest zone – the hadal
zone. The hadal zone is depths from 6,000 to nearly 11,000 m at Challenger Deep
in the Mariana Trench. For reference, the depth of the EPR is ~2500 m. Studying
the hadal zone is even more challenging than other parts of the deep ocean due
to these extreme depths. Our primary tool for biological sampling is autonomous
free-landers with traps baited with smelly fish, like mackerel, to attract <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2020/01/the-art-of-walking-in-wind.html" target="_blank">andhopefully catch scavengers</a>. The scavengers that I focused on were amphipods, a
type of crustacean. We had a targeted depth. But they landed where they landed.
<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">As part of this cruise, I used
two baited traps to examine the scavenging amphipod community of the active and
inactive vents. Both baited traps have a similar design – a PVC tube with a
funnel and a cap and mesh on the other. One trap was mounted on a lander. This
lander was deployed for 24 hours, carried a <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2021/02/the-pool.html" target="_blank">McLane Pump</a> to sample live larvae
in the water column for a pressure chamber experiment onboard, and was placed
on the edge of a vent by <i>Alvin</i>. The second trap was deployed and recovered by
<i>Alvin</i> – and has lovingly been named the Amphipod Handbag. The Handbag is the
same tube and funnel design but modified with weights on the horizontal side to
keep it weighted down and a rope handle for <i>Alvin</i>'s manipulator arm to set it
down and pick it up. While the design is simple, plenty of thought went into
making sure the Handbag fit into a biobox with the lid closed, it laid down
nicely, and the trap was vertical when picked up. Also, the exciting part was
deciding where precisely to place the Handbag – like on the edge of a <i>Riftia</i>
bush and mussel bed and at the top of Lucky's Mound – to capture a different
niche than the trap on the lander. Excitingly and primarily, I spotted
differences across deployments and potentially even a new species.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">My highlight happened on January
26, 2024, when I was the starboard observer on <i>Alvin</i> Dive 5224 to an inactive
vent called Lucky's Mound. I got to see with my own eyes the deep ocean and
deploy and recover the Handbag. Seeing the deep seafloor after many years of
thinking about it was utterly magical, profound, and <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2015/07/4804-part-4.html" target="_blank">nearly indescribable</a>. Beautiful,
alive, and so complex. Truly, it was a privilege to see this small part of the
deep ocean in person. This experience's mark on me will likely propel the
questions I ask for the rest of my career. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">As the cruise winds down and we
steam to Costa Rica, I am reflecting on my growth thanks to <i>Alvin</i> and its
Amphipod Handbag. More importantly, I am ready to get back to WHOI and uncover the
results and meaning of this new data.<o:p></o:p></p><br /><p class="MsoNormal">The EPR Biofilms4Larvae project is support by a
multi-institutional NSF grant: OCE-1948580 (Arellano), OCE-1947735
(Mullineaux), OCE-1948623 (Vetriani).<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The Inactive Sulfides project is support by a
multi-institutional NSF grant: OCE-2152453 (Mullineaux & Beaulieu) and
OCE-2152422 (Sylvan & Achberger).<o:p></o:p></p><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhiFb62xuKE2hKchHBF4KgWubkAMJ9HQ1PCPhgA77JBGQBaSXeVCHROOHEmqUXI4kDd3vgzNol_7QGLnNY8FD4E2OlOlkadgKyz1G6Xy9lyv2F8dlTKvmL-Frw0KNE3o1pyiCw_e0NtCRDyg3xIDKREV_uPkeoW22uVOjDaGX1-ToBo_D89RN2BBeON5YTW" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="549" data-original-width="975" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhiFb62xuKE2hKchHBF4KgWubkAMJ9HQ1PCPhgA77JBGQBaSXeVCHROOHEmqUXI4kDd3vgzNol_7QGLnNY8FD4E2OlOlkadgKyz1G6Xy9lyv2F8dlTKvmL-Frw0KNE3o1pyiCw_e0NtCRDyg3xIDKREV_uPkeoW22uVOjDaGX1-ToBo_D89RN2BBeON5YTW=w400-h225" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Wide
view of the first deployment of the Amphipod Handbag deployed by Alvin at the
base of a <i>Riftia</i> bush (tube worms) at an active vent named Tica Mound. Credit:
Shawn Arellano, Chief scientist, Western Washington University; Alvin Operations
Group; National Science Foundation; ©Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution<br /><br /></span><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiLFDfArAHuKSYFVHngtgKRpbRoyb6IhWZnWxsQ0XTHQWZRCmwE3ztKlirwaNuslUN6hiTdvZEyCxtxZPPzIsGFlrXZhohl-9KNZ4k7yfSonGwBKFU7c4_mdxRwykJCzebj0Yj8PmLOPpqgcMPlLscFn9rqtwkBLazLtVTOMf-yk8VlomW-tazAYVcvMFVH" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="552" data-original-width="981" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiLFDfArAHuKSYFVHngtgKRpbRoyb6IhWZnWxsQ0XTHQWZRCmwE3ztKlirwaNuslUN6hiTdvZEyCxtxZPPzIsGFlrXZhohl-9KNZ4k7yfSonGwBKFU7c4_mdxRwykJCzebj0Yj8PmLOPpqgcMPlLscFn9rqtwkBLazLtVTOMf-yk8VlomW-tazAYVcvMFVH=w400-h225" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Wide
view of the deployment of the Amphipod Handbag deployed by Alvin near the top
of the inactive sulfide feature named Lucky’s Mound. Credit: Shawn Arellano,
Chief scientist, Western Washington University; Alvin Operations Group;
National Science Foundation; ©Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution</span></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhZUBXOpQOfhYxz4qjdrypO96uaPqlVzVBDwkRZwG9MqbrQgQeVQ1H5rJE-0SOeLLz7t8xE3YlgWdFBOojIKavCZdnTcHL5zTsyHxyKhh0lGut6i59tgK7_FhMAlMyaeYGU6-PPbZ7-zQHRXniAIt435U80644Ul7wchn5UmuLipuiTRWyalvPrdvGIqbp7" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="549" data-original-width="975" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhZUBXOpQOfhYxz4qjdrypO96uaPqlVzVBDwkRZwG9MqbrQgQeVQ1H5rJE-0SOeLLz7t8xE3YlgWdFBOojIKavCZdnTcHL5zTsyHxyKhh0lGut6i59tgK7_FhMAlMyaeYGU6-PPbZ7-zQHRXniAIt435U80644Ul7wchn5UmuLipuiTRWyalvPrdvGIqbp7=w400-h225" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Zoomed
photo of the first deployment of the Amphipod Handbag with an eelpout looking
on. Credit: Shawn Arellano, Chief scientist, Western Washington University;
Alvin Operations Group; National Science Foundation; ©Woods Hole Oceanographic
Institution<br /><br /></span></td></tr></tbody></table></span></td></tr></tbody></table><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEihajuUkwDAC7bERCTCuSrGpQO1HyteQK6zPhKlB7XeGyyQaHBWx5MkkFlWbgm-UHehON6cUylhtTuCxlDaudZlryUhlH6PahGYFITVp1pzQCZJ_152C2cXThSOqT4E2lan-1E-1q2GLT_tL4Rg7clT8gcc8RWAZbfDBKJ27k9oN3oxu2jRWSEv7kFuvAQ2" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="554" data-original-width="986" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEihajuUkwDAC7bERCTCuSrGpQO1HyteQK6zPhKlB7XeGyyQaHBWx5MkkFlWbgm-UHehON6cUylhtTuCxlDaudZlryUhlH6PahGYFITVp1pzQCZJ_152C2cXThSOqT4E2lan-1E-1q2GLT_tL4Rg7clT8gcc8RWAZbfDBKJ27k9oN3oxu2jRWSEv7kFuvAQ2=w400-h225" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Looking
on to the recovery of the Amphipod Handbag by Alvin. Credit: Shawn Arellano,
Chief scientist, Western Washington University; Alvin Operations Group;
National Science Foundation; ©Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution</span></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjlkkTpYdLSdy04iuHlkhCbm6x644NhMcjCqskkzBcTLgxvL2I5D9IUSumX0s4mSjUFuXhcSqhPXAUrx9Jh8ObWnVqwwkQg11R9imB2zVDDx1QYULvdY8nF9nHfENI3SHd0rcizm8hp-M-tsHY2hXXNV1Co5ACps1-ZeRxnNNGhqwS6OTpgWBuUmxsOxfrm" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1300" data-original-width="975" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjlkkTpYdLSdy04iuHlkhCbm6x644NhMcjCqskkzBcTLgxvL2I5D9IUSumX0s4mSjUFuXhcSqhPXAUrx9Jh8ObWnVqwwkQg11R9imB2zVDDx1QYULvdY8nF9nHfENI3SHd0rcizm8hp-M-tsHY2hXXNV1Co5ACps1-ZeRxnNNGhqwS6OTpgWBuUmxsOxfrm=w300-h400" width="300" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><p class="MsoNormal">Wave goodbye at the Alvin hatch before the commute to work
on the seafloor. Credit: Costantino Vetriani.<o:p></o:p></p></td></tr></tbody></table><br /></div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-86957967459618172602024-02-01T11:03:00.000-05:002024-02-01T11:03:22.664-05:00Writing workshop<div style="text-align: left;">"Well, you know, I'm a physicist, so I thought about stuff...I wrote some of it down."</div><div style="text-align: left;">- the TV show <i>The Big Bang Theory</i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Every scientist has a backlog of papers they want to write. Every. Single. One. In fact, for as much as I adore <i>The Big Bang Theory</i>, the #1 thing that show gets wrong is how much free time the characters have. If the show were realistic, they would never have gaps between projects. Ever. Sheldon and Leonard would spend every episode in meetings, writing proposals, managing budgets, mentoring students, and desperately, hopelessly scraping together a few minutes to write papers here and there. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Sometimes, you just have to be selfish. Sometimes, you just have to shut your office door and work. Or better yet, don't work at the office so nobody can find you. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I'm not pointing any fingers here, but there may be a certain scientist working at an undisclosed off-campus location today. She might have decided to work remotely for personal reasons, but then she might have realized how great of an opportunity she had on her hands to actually get work done. Maybe she told her colleagues she was going to be gone, maybe not. Maybe she just needed a little peace and a writing workshop day. Maybe she's not sorry for prioritizing her own to-do list and even skipping out on a seminar. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Maybe she's going to log off the blog now and write her paper. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Maybe she's happy about that. </div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-23627074808557132922024-01-26T11:34:00.000-05:002024-01-26T11:34:25.962-05:00Tessellation<div style="text-align: left;">Man, it was a fun day it the lab yesterday. Kharis, Sarah, and I spent the whole morning working on a project together, and we managed to make great progress. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Recently, Kharis has been struggling to identify larvae from the Arctic. Don't get me wrong - we have a <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/12/in-cracks.html" target="_blank">good methodology</a>, thanks to a few years of struggling and about 6 months of Johanna troubleshooting. We can reliably get <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/02/those-bright-bands.html" target="_blank">good-quality sequences</a> from our specimens now. The DNA was not the problem (for once).</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Kharis's struggle has been morphology. She <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/01/dark-knight.html" target="_blank">sorted all her larvae</a> into categories based on how they looked in the field. It's a strategy I taught her - sort everything live, photograph and preserve the specimens, then sequence them back in the lab. By sorting up-front, you can save yourself a lot of time and just sequence a few representatives of each morphotype once you're home. If the sequences for those representatives line up, you have a reliable identification for the morphotype. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">If. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">See, that's the problem. Kharis's "Pluteus 1" came back as two different species. "Trochophore clear" was at least three. Animals that looked identical in the field were turning out to be different species. It was super frustrating, and we were afraid we would have to end up sequencing every single specimen. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Before throwing in the towel and spending a ton of money on sequencing, I suggested we try one more thing. Kharis photographed each larva in the field, remember. What if specimens that looked identical to her tired, overwhelmed field work brain were actually subtly different? Maybe if we printed out all the photos now, we could tell the species apart. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">We printed the photos. We labeled them individually. We cut them apart. We taped them to the white board. We stood back to get a good look. And then we sorted them. The lab became one giant tessellation with rectangular photos in orderly stacks and rows. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">By the end of the day, "Pluteus 1" had become 3 different morphotypes, and "Trochophore clear" was 6 or 8. We'll have to sequence more morphotypes now, but at least we can trust that all individuals in a morphotype are the same. We have confidence in our data again. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Cheers for scientific progress!</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEindYMONAbX7RjyUv_Qptw6aB_uN3VUGyWteXIJf43oZHLFS8sc8eXV7jAVjzWwoqOpjhSrFYFuRm5gQuXJN9q7hff3xMpwm8w_3P9OKj829kEhdx4mWl3V5R6hRlzSQCd8xb-QwpOZOJIFImELRdiFYamsB3By8AgHFIjl71Hj1oAhUnfu02OSSeaQWi5y/s2048/IMG_3575.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEindYMONAbX7RjyUv_Qptw6aB_uN3VUGyWteXIJf43oZHLFS8sc8eXV7jAVjzWwoqOpjhSrFYFuRm5gQuXJN9q7hff3xMpwm8w_3P9OKj829kEhdx4mWl3V5R6hRlzSQCd8xb-QwpOZOJIFImELRdiFYamsB3By8AgHFIjl71Hj1oAhUnfu02OSSeaQWi5y/s320/IMG_3575.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sarah and Kharis showing off their sorted photos.<br />Every pile on the floor represents a morphotype. <br />Images on the white board are sorted "pluteus 1."</td></tr></tbody></table><br /></div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-44234660260303662412024-01-24T17:24:00.003-05:002024-01-24T17:24:36.253-05:00The interns<div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB0KDzbd0X-svAzjzmTaB02OSvbk305qPqdfcv9AbKoQ153szn6WzwLFtx8RFjUnTgdg_OVsokbdok8yXIF8i7ZQWK2UzncAKcGU-ENrRnxrk9h3IqYOEo6r0gT-vGzRA_rN5_EQaXrE8LsT_CcndTJJzt3yjAToT9rN9Ldg-RZJ7sUBhbDljrkxxJ382I/s2048/IMG_3573.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1536" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB0KDzbd0X-svAzjzmTaB02OSvbk305qPqdfcv9AbKoQ153szn6WzwLFtx8RFjUnTgdg_OVsokbdok8yXIF8i7ZQWK2UzncAKcGU-ENrRnxrk9h3IqYOEo6r0gT-vGzRA_rN5_EQaXrE8LsT_CcndTJJzt3yjAToT9rN9Ldg-RZJ7sUBhbDljrkxxJ382I/w240-h320/IMG_3573.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Hollis joined the lab through his school's <br />mentorship program. </span></td></tr></tbody></table>Friends, I want to tell you about something magical that's happening in our lab right now. As you know, I am passionate about mentoring the next generation of scientists. It's why I've taken on a PhD student, a postdoc, and two summer undergraduates at WHOI. If my lab was at a standard university with all sorts of students running around, I would be the professor who proudly offered research opportunities to anyone who wanted the experience. Woods Hole is decidedly short on undergrads, but what we do have are high school students hungry for a chance. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">One student is doing <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/11/circle-circle-barnacle.html" target="_blank">his science fair project</a> under my lab's mentorship for the second year in a row. Two students who did internships with us last year asked if they could come back to keep learning. I also recently signed up for the mentorship program through a high school on Martha's Vineyard and got a <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/11/new-kid-on-block.html" target="_blank">fantastic new lab member</a>. Just this week, two more interns started in the lab, and they're already off and running. <br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Working with high school students is definitely not something I initially expected from my career, but it's something that I've come to greatly enjoy. Young students require a lot of supervision, but that actually has some good side effects. Every time there's a student in the lab, on of us (usually me or Kharis) ends up sitting at the microscope and working right alongside them. If there are more people than microscopes, we take our laptops out into the lab and watch closely. We end up having wide-ranging conversations with the students and get to know them pretty well. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOTdxAet_NKnLwChcBxHGE7g-0o8u3SXow40agxn32iyugghc8RSuHHPDaRTON_MhfblYVZQ3mysgVlPvz1M1VV1xtf5nSqA2kXDxD1SO96Q6yPIAg0uHgGrm2gqddqEB9ypyQoLD63eVx4BGs7IqxEVJbiByq11RZHtFwCZ-cGApifMaR04KULSPcgv19/s2048/IMG_3447.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOTdxAet_NKnLwChcBxHGE7g-0o8u3SXow40agxn32iyugghc8RSuHHPDaRTON_MhfblYVZQ3mysgVlPvz1M1VV1xtf5nSqA2kXDxD1SO96Q6yPIAg0uHgGrm2gqddqEB9ypyQoLD63eVx4BGs7IqxEVJbiByq11RZHtFwCZ-cGApifMaR04KULSPcgv19/s320/IMG_3447.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">K and O hard at work while Kharis stands by to assist. <br />These girls are all business.</span></td></tr></tbody></table>At first, there is a question about every 30 seconds. "What's that animal?" "Should I keep this specimen?" "Is this what we're looking for?" I do a lot of leaning over, peering through the eyepieces, and then uttering words the students have never heard before. "That's a copepod," or "that's a cyphonautes larva." Sometimes, we have to come up with nicknames - a cyphonautes is "the triangle thing." I love this part. It is an absolute joy to hover over the students' shoulders and watch them discover the beautiful, intricate world of zooplankton. <br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">We are extremely fortunate here in Woods Hole to have multiple programs through the local high schools that provide students with opportunities to learn by doing. Even if none of the kids who come through our lab end up as marine biologists, I sincerely hope they will walk away with new knowledge and a bit more confidence. </div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-84302058933195017122023-12-15T10:36:00.000-05:002023-12-15T10:36:13.578-05:00Textile art<div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmnji76ISpRjwsEra-BNGHqBdeWqwH-2RIWfdq0-mjoO_qLLwloDxiq-2LEUDlIzGeB_U6U1tkkHANtOtqpRhqPVBrryF-aEu_hTT5T9A4xzn-jb8b83rHpy5UxndAjLZJC0tIn-nmftt4metFo3xye4ZPQeADZCT38XRz3IxithXuk76-YcDGcukWBXJ2/s2048/Mini%20net%20at%20AVAST.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1536" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmnji76ISpRjwsEra-BNGHqBdeWqwH-2RIWfdq0-mjoO_qLLwloDxiq-2LEUDlIzGeB_U6U1tkkHANtOtqpRhqPVBrryF-aEu_hTT5T9A4xzn-jb8b83rHpy5UxndAjLZJC0tIn-nmftt4metFo3xye4ZPQeADZCT38XRz3IxithXuk76-YcDGcukWBXJ2/s320/Mini%20net%20at%20AVAST.jpeg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Johanna's photo: high-tech crafting</span></td></tr></tbody></table>When I arrived at work this morning, my postdoc, Johanna, pulled up a photo on her phone to show me. Proudly, she held the screen up to my face and then started giggling. The photo was taken in WHOI's AVAST facility - a high-tech work space on WHOI's campus. AVAST stands for Autonomous Vehicles And Sensor Technologies, but the facility is meant to be a collaboration hub for all kinds of research and technology development. It's a very 21st-century, open-concept, community-use work space outfitted with 3D printers and test tanks. The high ceiling and garage-style doors let robotic undersea vehicles come in and out. There are several vehicles being worked on at AVAST right now - a mid-water vehicle that follows fishes and collects their DNA, a full-ocean-depth vehicle with sensors that can handle the pressure at 11,000 m deep, even a titanium sphere that I think belongs to the submersible <i>Alvin</i>. AVAST is by every measure a technological center of activity. <br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">In the middle of the high-ceiling, high-tech AVAST work space sat Johanna, working diligently with...her sewing machine. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">It may not be as high-tech as some of the other tools at AVAST, but that sewing machine came from Johanna's house to WHOI for a very distinct reason: sewing a plankton net. And it was just as necessary as any of the AVAST resources. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Recently, Johanna has been building a zooplankton sampler that can operate anywhere in the ocean - down to full ocean depth, 11 km below the surface. Johanna did her PhD on hadal trench communities and has helped out with sorting and <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/10/by-perseverance.html" target="_blank">identifying zooplankton</a> in my lab. The natural next step was to combine those two interests and start researching zooplankton communities in the hadal zone. The only problem: no sampler currently in existence could collect zooplankton samples at hadal depths. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">That's where AVAST comes in. Using the 3D printers and picking the brains of AVAST's electrical and mechanical engineers has given Johanna the technological developmental platform she needs. The zooplankton sampler is coming along very nicely, and I'm proud of her progress. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Johanna's sewing machine moment reminded me of all the women textile artists in the mid-20th century. Crafts deserve their place in the art world, and crafting certainly <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2021/10/rumpelstiltskin.html" target="_blank">has its place</a> in the <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2017/06/arts-and-crafts.html" target="_blank">world of science</a>. Thanks to AVAST and textile art, the world's first hadal zooplankton sampler is taking shape.</div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-75204261712078713632023-12-13T13:46:00.000-05:002023-12-13T13:46:19.177-05:00In the cracks<div style="text-align: left;">"There is a crack in everything</div><div style="text-align: left;">That's how the light gets in"</div><div style="text-align: left;">- "Anthem" by Leonard Cohen</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Friends, we are approaching the end of a calendar year, and I find myself feeling pressed. In many ways, the change of a calendar year is arbitrary, but I definitely have some projects that I don't want to carry over into another annum. The <i>Porites</i> <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/11/the-spawning-paper.html" target="_blank">spawning paper</a> has finally been submitted. The zooplankton samples Sarah had been working <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/12/milestone-passed.html" target="_blank">on are done</a>. Yet, I find <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2017/03/like-helix.html" target="_blank">myself spinning</a> around, looking for something else I can accomplish before the year ends. I have to fill in the cracks between major projects with minor victories. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJn6-LMgMnnTK1Ki7dDEupCzaxb8V4R0GEpIdPs0hsHG7bmow4-L7ynyxp5T8AlxrGAuEeDPHsO8VAYHtDSKQ5fLsAK0jHAvYY0PO5YiG0xMpzFGfvhAHIpv3nmRmWBUTPUJc1Ari7zMhLJHXVEVTa4JMmLCPpK9G3TDR_yCwIM7S_8-Kp34WGjv7mVzCL/s1654/IMG_3449.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1335" data-original-width="1654" height="258" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJn6-LMgMnnTK1Ki7dDEupCzaxb8V4R0GEpIdPs0hsHG7bmow4-L7ynyxp5T8AlxrGAuEeDPHsO8VAYHtDSKQ5fLsAK0jHAvYY0PO5YiG0xMpzFGfvhAHIpv3nmRmWBUTPUJc1Ari7zMhLJHXVEVTa4JMmLCPpK9G3TDR_yCwIM7S_8-Kp34WGjv7mVzCL/s320/IMG_3449.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">This <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2018/11/test-run.html" target="_blank">electrophoresis gel</a> shows my minor victory. On the left <br />side is a DNA ladder. Every band across the middle of the <br />gel represents a successful a DNA section that I will be able <br />to sequence. As you can see, I was very successful!</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Yesterday, I had a minor victory. In this gap between large datasets, I turned my attention to some mysterious Arctic <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/10/name-that-fungus.html" target="_blank">deep-sea specimens</a>. I've been trying to identify them ever since collecting them in 2021. When I first saw the blue and gold orbs 2 years ago, I was convinced they were <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2021/06/no-rest-for-weary.html" target="_blank">sponge larvae</a>. DNA analysis proved that to be false, but a misreading of the genetics database made me think they were fungi. After corresponding with a marine fungus expert and several failed attempts at sequencing, I now know them to be oomycetes - a group of organisms that look like fungi but are actually related to diatoms. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Normally, I would probably write the specimens off. They're not the sponge larvae I thought they were, so they really don't belong in my research program. But here's the thing: oomycetes are a ridiculously understudied group of organisms. We're almost certainly dealing with a new species here, so I can't just leave them behind. I have to see this project to its conclusion. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">My <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2020/01/surprise-visitors.html" target="_blank">fungus guy, Brandon</a>, recommended a set of oomycete DNA primers that could hopefully help me get a good sequence from my specimens. I used the primers in a PCR this week, and for the first time, I actually got good results! The primers worked! </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">My next step is sequencing, so cross your fingers for continued good results. I'm actually super excited to delve into the realm of microbiology and figure out what this super weird-looking Arctic deep sea organism is! </div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-26783478863519059762023-12-04T12:08:00.000-05:002023-12-04T12:08:06.643-05:00And the Emmy goes to...<div style="text-align: left;">Friends, you might remember that the episode of <i>Changing Seas</i> that Kharis and I were featured in was nominated for a <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/10/the-nomination.html" target="_blank">Suncoast Regional Emmy</a>. The award ceremony took place this past weekend, and I'm proud to announce that our episode won! I am incredibly proud of our PBS partners and honored to be part of their award-winning work. You can watch Alexa Elliott and Jacquelyn Hurtado accept the award below. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">If you haven't seen "Life in the dark: the polar night," check it out here: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAS0osFsneI">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAS0osFsneI</a></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allow="autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="true" frameborder="0" height="476" scrolling="no" src="https://www.facebook.com/plugins/video.php?height=476&href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fchangingseas%2Fvideos%2F890839089219584%2F&show_text=false&width=267&t=0" style="border: none; overflow: hidden;" width="267"></iframe></div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-48873625962208225192023-12-01T17:44:00.000-05:002023-12-01T17:44:30.875-05:00Milestone passed!<div style="text-align: left;">Friends, we had an exciting day in the lab this week. After 3 months of solid work, sorting animals day in and day out, and countless hours sitting at a microscope, Sarah finished a dataset! </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhp5AjWlrjwfm-oQ197Bwjl6kcpEdKELlLQsBCVifhMNni0bcak-P9h6byzSImtjrteETAJJZtzfo_ETK_fGLdeFZQ3tBF9RIbf8sqL4RM5E8rNZAevZvRgPY8IPxMSsxfrdQBH0NiXlutuS1L0T2By_ctIzuukOMTG3FcGRG0befYBMRo-TwSt9IOot6Ym/s4032/IMG_3425.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhp5AjWlrjwfm-oQ197Bwjl6kcpEdKELlLQsBCVifhMNni0bcak-P9h6byzSImtjrteETAJJZtzfo_ETK_fGLdeFZQ3tBF9RIbf8sqL4RM5E8rNZAevZvRgPY8IPxMSsxfrdQBH0NiXlutuS1L0T2By_ctIzuukOMTG3FcGRG0befYBMRo-TwSt9IOot6Ym/s320/IMG_3425.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Sarah and I tracked her progress on the white <br />board, and we were both clearly excited to <br />update it when all sorting was finished! Photo<br />by Johanna Weston. </span></td></tr></tbody></table>You might remember that my lab is collaborating on a study with the Palau International Coral Reef Center. Our goal is characterize the biodiversity of zooplankton in Palau National Marine Sanctuary. PICRC staff collected net tow samples in 2022, I brought them to WHOI last spring, and poor Sarah has been analyzing them ever since. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">There are so many species. Seriously. <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/10/by-perseverance.html" target="_blank">So. Many. Species.</a> It's kind of funny that there's another zooplankton project happening in the lab at the same time - Kharis is working on <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/11/new-kid-on-block.html" target="_blank">a set of samples</a> from the high Arctic. It feels a bit like we've undertaken a case study in latitudinal clines in biodiversity, because the Palau samples and the Arctic samples are a world apart. So far, Kharis has uncovered a handful of species in her Arctic samples - a barnacle larva, some worm larvae, one very common species of clam. Meanwhile, Sarah has sat at the microscope right next to Kharis, drowning in species. We had dozens of snails, 7 different types of clam larvae, and at least 10 larval sea stars. It's honestly been insane. Altogether, Sarah sorted over 500 species from the Palau samples. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Finishing the sorting was a huge milestone. The project is far from over - after all, we have to identify all of those species - but we're enjoying the sweet taste of victory for now. <br /></div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-260596214715361732023-11-22T14:47:00.001-05:002023-11-22T14:47:28.049-05:00New kid on the block<div><span style="font-family: inherit;">"I'm a new kid on the block</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit;">Though I may not be Johann Sebastian Bach"</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit;">- "New Kid (on the Block)" by BNL</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit;">Whenever a new person sits down at a microscope in the lab, it takes a few minutes for them to get </span>oriented. They have to learn to adjust the eyepieces to fit the width of their face. They take a minute to find the focus knob, then scroll up and down until the specimen comes into clear view. It's a process. </div><div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiijMqPvwqkSgPPJbo6u3Yk3NJe-0jfDQL6KHp6QFwJ18C5d0BElMwlKRFekKHe9E0yl1MumN6Ak2jAhG4mqJlhyphenhyphenDApaiE1Qp05-dj8zt5SvpENqnLNPY835YJET31aUCCeQhejoS7kgQsNyOLVC7PA8YtRltUr32Ofl0dopoNjpez2YN8VaXaADoB9yQy5/s1678/3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1451" data-original-width="1678" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiijMqPvwqkSgPPJbo6u3Yk3NJe-0jfDQL6KHp6QFwJ18C5d0BElMwlKRFekKHe9E0yl1MumN6Ak2jAhG4mqJlhyphenhyphenDApaiE1Qp05-dj8zt5SvpENqnLNPY835YJET31aUCCeQhejoS7kgQsNyOLVC7PA8YtRltUr32Ofl0dopoNjpez2YN8VaXaADoB9yQy5/s320/3.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Some pteropod larvae (baby snails) in the sample I showed H. </span></td></tr></tbody></table><br /></div><div>I have a new high schooler in the lab, H, thanks to a mentoring program at a local high school. The mentorship in my lab is the first time he's been exposed to tiny animals like larvae, but he's very eager to learn. I showed him how to use the microscope, adjust the eyepieces, change focus, and make himself comfortable. I stood back. "What do you see?" I asked.</div><div><br /></div><div>At this point in the process, the student usually mentions something about copepods. They won't know what they are, but they'll ask me about the white shrimp-y things.</div><div><br /></div><div>Not H. The first thing he noticed - the first thing out of the entire dish - were the bivalves. I was honestly stunned. The bivalves were tiny! The kid has a heart for larvae, though. He's going to fit in here. </div><div><br /></div><div>After we talked about and looked at the bivalves for a bit, I asked H what else he saw in the dish. Again, he ignored the copepods and pointed me to some baby snails. <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2020/06/born-this-way-part-2.html" target="_blank">Pteropod larvae</a> were everywhere, and even though they were smaller than almost anything else, H picked them out with ease.</div><div><br /></div><div>I am passionate about getting younger generations involved in science, and it's so satisfying to work with H. I hope his mentorship at WHOI can be a transformative experience. He's already made a great start!</div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-18956660564105244952023-11-20T09:47:00.000-05:002023-11-20T09:47:05.652-05:00The spawning paperMan, it's hard to believe a few weeks have already gone by. As the adage goes, time flies when you're having fun. In this case, it seems I lost track of time while...well, having fun. <div><br /></div><div>My favorite part of my job is writing. In fact, I wish I had known back in college how much of my time I would spend writing as a scientist. It is so indescribably satisfying to take a set of data, condense it down into a few clear patterns, and then fill pages with words to tell the world what you've found. </div><div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-XG503i5Gx6uFCqtC5hNT4MWZq5JHqh2ORlhF2cFPOLEMUiDxt3XReAXpnKHjx1Pd8WYxF5vPn5VIKL3jZ1XdH091gFshNANHv_wfYNnyaJx3fUR6hDZLXJDeIx2jSMwZtoHwO26eX5BoLpog-jMwHMKDJPdTmQY-Y60VTOZqaBLQ72cvktu3x9JK_FN6/s3648/OT%20juve%205x%20(5).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2736" data-original-width="3648" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-XG503i5Gx6uFCqtC5hNT4MWZq5JHqh2ORlhF2cFPOLEMUiDxt3XReAXpnKHjx1Pd8WYxF5vPn5VIKL3jZ1XdH091gFshNANHv_wfYNnyaJx3fUR6hDZLXJDeIx2jSMwZtoHwO26eX5BoLpog-jMwHMKDJPdTmQY-Y60VTOZqaBLQ72cvktu3x9JK_FN6/s320/OT%20juve%205x%20(5).jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Newly settled <i>Porites lobata</i> corals.</span></td></tr></tbody></table><br /></div><div>The past few weeks, I've been writing about a coral. You know it well - <i><a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2021/11/porites.html" target="_blank">Porites lobata</a></i>, the species my team has worked on in Palau since 2018. Over the past two years, we figured out <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/04/strawberry-milkshake.html" target="_blank">when <i>P. lobata</i> spawns</a>, got colonies to <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/04/keep-watch.html" target="_blank">spawn in the lab</a> in Palau, <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/04/stride-of-pride.html" target="_blank">reared the larvae</a>, and even <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/04/transplant-day.html" target="_blank">settled them on tiles</a>. Along the way, we made really important observations - <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/05/the-taj.html" target="_blank">what cues</a> make the adults spawn, what size the eggs are, how <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/04/frozen-in-time.html" target="_blank">quickly the larvae</a> develop, what settlement cues the larvae <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/04/settle.html" target="_blank">respond to best</a>. It's been an incredible amount of work. </div><div><br /></div><div>And now it's time to tell the world. Our data will be valuable not just for other researchers, but for non-profits doing coral restoration as well. For years, coral research has heavily emphasized branching species in the genus <i>Acropora</i>. Sure, <i>Acropora</i> corals are sensitive to bleaching, but restoration of just one genus does not make a healthy reef. There have been calls for scientists to investigate reproduction in a broad range of coral species. By understanding reproduction and larval development in more than just <i>Acropora</i>, we can lay the foundation for restoration of diverse, thriving coral reefs. </div><div><br /></div><div>In my mind, <i>Porites</i> is one of the most important coral genera to understand, because <i>Porites</i> corals are so resilient in the face of bleaching. <i>Porites</i> to me represents the future of coral reefs. </div><div><br /></div><div>Hopefully, our data will help push both science and coral restoration in the right direction. I'm waiting on final comments from a few co-authors, and then I should be able to submit the paper! </div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-73642853956965457062023-11-02T16:57:00.002-04:002023-11-02T16:57:54.764-04:00Circle, circle, barnacle<div style="text-align: left;">Earlier this fall, I received a very exciting email. A local high school student who had worked with my lab last year wondered if I would mentor him through his science fair project again. I immediately answered yes!</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">My lab has a lot going on right now, so there were plenty of options to choose from. The student, Erik, is very interested in biofouling, so I decided to entrust him with a dataset from the high Arctic. As some of you might remember, Kharis successfully <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/08/catain-lives.html" target="_blank">recovered CATAIN</a> from its <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/01/catain-day.html" target="_blank">spot at 79 N</a> last August. The camera yielded fantastic <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/05/the-catain-paper.html" target="_blank">image data</a> showing settlement and post-settlement mortality in a fouling community over 8 months. It's an incredible dataset with really exciting, novel information hidden within. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSRLeJsBEzqb12-BwcjHef0SaXGsTSyxYAdGU82glmQPYRTrP3P5FiKag0YgbOanVOCWVJu8NHLSL4W2nXeOP-7WcWy2b7-Yxzpd7qyYOYjmW4VfsqtIm0RX9_CV2IyD-dNkvQv9ngJrmfiSW6zNF_BkViuo_lNt9y0FJOl7RWIFFCvo5Pmt5wiSdCsLpt/s4032/IMG_3371.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSRLeJsBEzqb12-BwcjHef0SaXGsTSyxYAdGU82glmQPYRTrP3P5FiKag0YgbOanVOCWVJu8NHLSL4W2nXeOP-7WcWy2b7-Yxzpd7qyYOYjmW4VfsqtIm0RX9_CV2IyD-dNkvQv9ngJrmfiSW6zNF_BkViuo_lNt9y0FJOl7RWIFFCvo5Pmt5wiSdCsLpt/s320/IMG_3371.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Kharis and Erik working together on CATAIN images.</span></td></tr></tbody></table>In order to go from images to numbers to understanding, someone has to sit down and circle all the barnacles. That's right - our images are chock <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2017/04/more-interesting.html" target="_blank">full of barnacles</a>. Beyond just counts, we can use a specialized image analysis program to measure their sizes and tell how large each individual was when it settled and when it died. Once the tedious part is done, we can compare settlement, growth, and mortality rates to all sorts of environmental factors to figure out what's driving the community. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Erik was enthusiastic about the image analysis and even more excited to study a high Arctic ecosystem for his science fair project! After an initial set-up meeting at the lab, Erik worked independently at home to circle all the barnacles. He checked in with us last week, and he's making great progress! </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div>Kharis and Erik actually took over my office for a few hours, because I have a large monitor for image analysis. Painstakingly, they went through every pixel of that first image. Every ambiguous blob was reviewed. Barnacles, tube worms, snails, and interesting unknowns were marked. We decided on a method to track barnacle growth. We discussed what analyses might be most interesting. <div><br /></div><div>It's immensely satisfying to guide a young student through data analysis. Erik has very clear ideas of the scientific questions he wants to answer, and Kharis and I can help him get there. I'm glad to have him involved in the lab, and hopefully, his science fair project will stand out!</div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-16292240003861992232023-10-17T15:00:00.001-04:002023-10-17T15:00:54.477-04:00By perseverance<div style="text-align: left;">"By perseverance, the snail reached the Ark." </div><div style="text-align: left;">- Charles Spurgeon</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Leading a research lab is like trying to write a book in a tornado. Every day, I sit at my desk and put text on paper, hoping my words will compel a federal agency or a private foundation to grant us the money we need to keep going. Or I deal with finances, correspondence, and standardized forms - the hum-drum paperwork that for some reason the world requires. If I'm lucky, I get to write a paper reporting our scientific results. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Meanwhile, my lab is a flurry of activity. An incessant clicking from the far corner indicates my technician, Sarah, is busy counting zooplankton. My postdoc, Johanna, paces around the molecular biology bench as she extracts and <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/02/those-bright-bands.html" target="_blank">amplifies DNA</a> from tiny larvae. New boxes of samples showed up in the freezer last night, indicating my PhD student, Kharis, is finally home from her own <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/08/catain-lives.html" target="_blank">whirlwind research</a> trip in the <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/01/northernmost-community.html" target="_blank">high Arctic</a>. Multiple times per day, someone sticks their head into my office to announce a victory, share a struggle, or ask for advice. In the middle of it all, my phone chimes with text messages from Calvin, who is currently working remotely on his own complementary projects. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Recently, Sarah has had a tornado of her own to deal with - or maybe this one is more of a tsunami. The poor girl is practically drowning in snails. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3Fu3mAGm6PjlWh91f4xZtdbi6_V7dYtnFWlGLt7b9yRcSklVEiv7In_iU1XknR0u0FhYDE1BCJQF-LS2dyxP5lp-Yn4634xeonWxVNGGYm8ko07YVEB37Ogw_uHOY0QDHNeFX37wIgYwhmu1QKsYrGQl8bJMA35YBOBZTMiVUDxZVVHxiAQIW73yfOmpd/s3648/image003.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2736" data-original-width="3648" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3Fu3mAGm6PjlWh91f4xZtdbi6_V7dYtnFWlGLt7b9yRcSklVEiv7In_iU1XknR0u0FhYDE1BCJQF-LS2dyxP5lp-Yn4634xeonWxVNGGYm8ko07YVEB37Ogw_uHOY0QDHNeFX37wIgYwhmu1QKsYrGQl8bJMA35YBOBZTMiVUDxZVVHxiAQIW73yfOmpd/s320/image003.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">An array of snail larvae in one zooplankton sample from Palau.<br />Photo by Sarah Zuidema.</span></td></tr></tbody></table>My lab is currently collaborating on a project with the <a href="http://picrc.org/" target="_blank">Palau International Coral Reef Center</a> to characterize the zooplankton in Palau's EEZ. As you might remember, I've made several <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/04/quirks-of-life-in-palau-part-2.html" target="_blank">trips to Palau</a> in the past few years for <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/11/bleaching-pairs.html" target="_blank">coral research</a>. One of the scientists there was excited to learn that I had a background in <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2015/07/4804.html" target="_blank">deep-sea biology</a> and experience <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2021/06/hot-doughnuts-now.html" target="_blank">identifying larvae</a>. She asked if I could help analyze a set of zooplankton samples from Palau's large National Marine Sanctuary. Of course I agreed, and I brought the samples home with me from Palau <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/05/a-journey-of-thousand-years.html" target="_blank">last May</a>. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Sarah is now wading through the samples one by one, and she has discovered incredible biodiversity. I asked her to sort all the animals to morphotype - don't bother identifying them at first, just sort them into groups that look alike. So far, we're up to 374 morphotypes, and there is no end in sight. <br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">One of the most diverse groups is the snails. We have dozens of morphotypes of snails, all presumably either the larval forms of benthic species or pteropods that spend their whole life in the water. Johanna has started barcoding some of the morphotypes, and it actually looks like most species are benthic. Even morphotypes we originally labeled as pteropods are turning out to be larval limpets and whelks and periwinkles. I'm actually super excited to find such an incredible diversity of gastropod larvae offshore in the tropical Pacific. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">We have a lot of work ahead of us, that's for sure. I advised Sarah to take one snail at a time - you don't have to get through all of them, just one. And then another. And then another. By perseverance, we will get there. If Sarah is the snail crawling up the ramp to the Ark one inch at a time while the storm brews around her, I suppose I'm the captain, calling orders from the deck of the ship and furiously <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/09/magellan.html" target="_blank">writing proposals</a> to finance the expedition. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">By perseverance, we will get there. </div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-48764145595574938022023-10-16T16:09:00.000-04:002023-10-16T16:09:37.213-04:00The nominationFriends, I have some very exciting news to share today. "Life in the dark: the polar night" has been nominated for a Suncoast Regional Emmy award! <div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIIlZVX0g3pIBRT8ZA-3ETbpxmtAGAufP1M_7xaCutZwg6L492JIRZm6G8V5kxhcaw8PgqGBx14tTLNN95q5NBYuJQulmqzxSH2dRLeg2WbANDdRa3a5OTMzwgNXYvIfEqTgZFNK7HUmfnqqYhBBqHzwx7lSx6t1HKR_1gKNDyNmFxRvdjweEB1-x9Hyij/s1623/emmy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1623" data-original-width="1280" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIIlZVX0g3pIBRT8ZA-3ETbpxmtAGAufP1M_7xaCutZwg6L492JIRZm6G8V5kxhcaw8PgqGBx14tTLNN95q5NBYuJQulmqzxSH2dRLeg2WbANDdRa3a5OTMzwgNXYvIfEqTgZFNK7HUmfnqqYhBBqHzwx7lSx6t1HKR_1gKNDyNmFxRvdjweEB1-x9Hyij/s320/emmy.jpg" width="252" /></a></div><br /></div><div>In January 2023, my grad student, Kharis, and I were joined in the field by a <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/01/changing-seas.html" target="_blank">film crew</a> from South Florida PBS. The producer, Alexa Elliott, wanted to share the story of our high Arctic research as part of the series <i><a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/06/changing-seas-part-2.html" target="_blank">Changing Seas</a></i>. Our episode premiered on TV and online in June. You can watch it anytime on YouTube: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAS0osFsneI">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAS0osFsneI</a></div><div><br /></div><div>It is incredibly exciting for an episode featuring my lab's research to be nominated for this award. If you check the list of nominees, you'll notice that another <i>Changing Seas</i> episode was also nominated! Alexa and her production team do incredible work, and I am glad to see them receive much-deserved recognition. </div><div><br /></div><div>The Suncoast Regional Emmy Awards event is on December 2. It is an honor to be nominated, but I also hope the <i>Changing Seas</i> team walks away with at least one award!<br /><br /></div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-72656346821815375232023-10-13T17:20:00.000-04:002023-10-13T17:20:37.509-04:00Name that fungus!<div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhe6q6fiBZb57fcW1MG9pOtFVI63NiNhgmdNeEeFaNek-Rn_mKJfUtXTgzWCaWTm9J4QGIA1JuULTwxEkzVIokgneHe0Jv6cSXNHnqhnitq_7BZkYIIrrfUfaRsGRWYExexLsk6eR8E4lf0qYE8cJGQAmdxbdPWJc2jX_EsdcS5FURUucx0VgSXEqoBD0HK/s1732/HG-2021-20%204.5x_2021-06-01-005435-0000_crop.tif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1500" data-original-width="1732" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhe6q6fiBZb57fcW1MG9pOtFVI63NiNhgmdNeEeFaNek-Rn_mKJfUtXTgzWCaWTm9J4QGIA1JuULTwxEkzVIokgneHe0Jv6cSXNHnqhnitq_7BZkYIIrrfUfaRsGRWYExexLsk6eR8E4lf0qYE8cJGQAmdxbdPWJc2jX_EsdcS5FURUucx0VgSXEqoBD0HK/s320/HG-2021-20%204.5x_2021-06-01-005435-0000_crop.tif" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">The mysterious specimen</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Back in 2021, Kharis and I took a deep-sea <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2021/02/the-pool.html" target="_blank">plankton pump</a> to the Arctic. The pump was installed <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2021/05/vorbereitungen-preparations.html" target="_blank">on a lander</a> by my German collaborators at the Alfred Wegener Institute and sent down to the deep. From 2.5 km away, Kharis and I wished and hoped for good samples, sending good vibes to the pump whenever we could. We got some <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2021/06/hot-doughnuts-now.html" target="_blank">incredible specimens</a>. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Of all the <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2021/06/the-molloy-deep.html" target="_blank">beautiful larvae</a> we collected that trip, one stood out to me. I pulled it from the watery sample, not knowing what it was. It kind of resembled an egg. Maybe it was an elusive deep-sea larva, I thought, but I wasn't sure what kind. We found 20 of them - sparkly blue orbs with gold flecks. A few of them were housed inside a loose mesh of spikes. My invertebrate-seeking mind concluded that the spikes must be sponge spicules, and we had found the first sponge larvae from the Arctic deep sea.<br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">You can imagine my excitement when, months later, Kharis got a successful sequence from one of the mystery orbs. Here we go, I thought to myself, finally proof that we have found a sponge larva! I even had an idea what species it could be. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">We ran the sequence against a massive online database. We held our breath while the algorithm searched for a match. The screen showed our results. The precious specimens were...</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Well, not sponges, that's for sure. The list of results included some brown algae and two reasonably good matches in a group called "oomycetes." I was equal parts disappointed or confused.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I recognized the suffice "-mycete" from high school biology. Deep in the recesses of my mind, a definition emerged. Something ending in "-mycete" is usually a fungus. Had...had we found a marine fungus??</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Lucky for me, I have a fungus guy. His name is Brandon, and we met in a training program for early-career researchers <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2018/01/mcmurdo.html" target="_blank">in Antarctica</a> in 2018. Two years later, in 2020, I ran into him while doing field work <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2020/01/surprise-visitors.html" target="_blank">in Svalbard</a>. I'm telling you, friends, the world is small. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">It took me a bit to find Brandon's current contact information, but once I told him I had an Arctic deep-sea fungus, he was all in. We've been e-mailing back and forth for weeks, brainstorming ways to identify the fungus - especially because it's probably a new species. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">We ran into one pretty game-changing twist just a few days ago. I had ordered a set of DNA primers meant for fungi and was getting nowhere with them. Failed PCR after failed PCR left me utterly discouraged. Then I mentioned to Brandon that my top result for the specimen had been labeled an "oomycete" and his message back said it all. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">"OooooooooooooooOoooOooooo" began the text. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Apparently, oomycetes are not true fungi. They're a weird group of organisms that act like fungi but are actually related to diatoms. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Friends, I really don't want to count chickens, but I'm even more excited about these specimens now. Oomycetes are extremely poorly studied, and we might be dealing with something novel. The next step is to hunt down a set of DNA primers I could use to sequence an oomycete and see if it works. I'm really enjoying this little side-quest into deep-sea diversity. Cross your fingers we get good results!</div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-44361087632971352022023-09-26T17:13:00.001-04:002023-09-26T17:13:20.325-04:00Magellan<div style="text-align: left;">"The sea is dangerous and its storms terrible, but these obstacles have never been sufficient reason to remain ashore." </div><div style="text-align: left;">- Ferdinand Magellan</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">In grad school, one of my friends used to say that he was a professional reader. At the time, he was working on a review paper that would constitute the introduction to his thesis, so he wasn't entirely wrong. I think he read a few hundred papers that year. He had to be deeply familiar with his field in order to craft the review. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih0aOOyfhVPQP0-x1c1xj59CVINxoni4JmKlkqYibukJf29rWbZbqCoWQV47VR0phMK26Yso5fPQ5i2pyb36X3V98YJ1PtKmE3HPooIf_xuHh4C9htJYcq7BCdDykmU7sp9S1bBQtSSOrrLlLLkalkCCeXM7QqrgZxbtufIkseUxDnBv02G5cbPntlylWB/s1600/IMG_3322.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih0aOOyfhVPQP0-x1c1xj59CVINxoni4JmKlkqYibukJf29rWbZbqCoWQV47VR0phMK26Yso5fPQ5i2pyb36X3V98YJ1PtKmE3HPooIf_xuHh4C9htJYcq7BCdDykmU7sp9S1bBQtSSOrrLlLLkalkCCeXM7QqrgZxbtufIkseUxDnBv02G5cbPntlylWB/s320/IMG_3322.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Atlantic sea scallop, <i>Placopecten magellanicus</i>.<br />Can you see the growth rings?</span></td></tr></tbody></table><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Science involves not just the search for knowledge but a familiarity with all previous knowledge. Right now, I find myself in a phase that could very well be described as "professional reading." I've read some 50 papers about sea scallops in the last week. My eyes are getting tired. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Why am I busy ingesting scallop facts, you ask? There's a good reason, trust me. One of my colleagues at WHOI recently invited me to collaborate on a proposal about sea scallops. He even asked if I would be comfortable leading the proposal, so you better bet I'm going to learn everything I can about scallops before we submit. I need to know what I'm talking about. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Sea scallops, <i>Placopecten magellanicus</i>, are the basis for one of the most lucrative fisheries in the U.S. Every time you order a perfectly-seared scallop at a restaurant, that succulent morsel started in the ocean. Properly managing a sustainable scallop fishery requires scientific research - and lots of it. Scallops are broadcast spawners with larvae that spend over a month in the water column. From year to year, there are huge variations in spawning, survival of larvae, and the ocean currents that carry them to their new homes. All those factors contribute to scallop recruitment - how many scallops reach the seafloor and survive to enter the fishery. Predicting scallop recruitment is a nasty, hairy mathematical challenge, but it's also key to maintaining a stable stock of scallops. If managers close off an area that has no scallop recruitment but open an area to fishing that has a ton of baby scallops trying to grow, we might disturb the population and not have any scallops to fish the following year. It's a complex problem, and that's why fishery managers partner with scientists to figure it all out. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRkm2FUlt1S28xybzegT_I0ii8CzvyjdaqPM0xpNBoCqAnsOUyp8oaUBbdgRjmUh7344tuVbE20cgd0KoMGBc7XKSIS8dsrIlabLyxkX8hvCvBfVa3e123lPk56sdZESd1j9baE8com-918SPIrqQt7qoDtMm8P7SXfuRiIbur_nbB-oIardm8-Y8jifCn/s1536/IMG_3328.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1395" data-original-width="1536" height="291" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRkm2FUlt1S28xybzegT_I0ii8CzvyjdaqPM0xpNBoCqAnsOUyp8oaUBbdgRjmUh7344tuVbE20cgd0KoMGBc7XKSIS8dsrIlabLyxkX8hvCvBfVa3e123lPk56sdZESd1j9baE8com-918SPIrqQt7qoDtMm8P7SXfuRiIbur_nbB-oIardm8-Y8jifCn/s320/IMG_3328.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">The white dashed line shows the outline of the larval shell on<br />a scallop. There's also a hitchhiker! The white arrow points to<br />a small limpet that's living on the scallop shell. </span></td></tr></tbody></table>One really cool thing about scallops is that they keep records in their shells. Over the course of their lifetime, each scallop is constantly working to grow new shell. The shell they made when they were young sits close to the hinge, and the newest part of the shell is out at the edge. They grow faster in the summer, when food is more available, and slower in the winter, when there's not quite so much to eat. This pattern results in annual growth rings in the shell, much like a tree. If you count the rings, you can tell how old the scallop is. <br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">If you have a small scallop that's recently settled on the seafloor, you might even be able to tell where it came from and what environmental conditions it experienced along the way. Scallops keep their larval shell after metamorphosing and settling on the seafloor. In a lot of species, the larval shell gets eroded away, so you really can't see it after a while. I wanted to test whether young juvenile scallops still have visible larval shells and whether I could use them for measurements in our study. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div>My team's partners at the Cape Cod Commercial Fishermen's Alliance sent out a request to the fishermen: grab a few small scallops next time you're out fishing, so Kirstin can do a test. A few days later, one of the CCCFA staff members showed up at my house in the early morning with a bag of 10 frozen scallops, and I brought them to the lab. <div><br /></div><div>Thankfully, I can actually see the larval shell under the microscope! It's a bit difficult to discern the edges, especially in the larger scallops, but the shell is not eroded away. I should be able to use the calcareous records of environmental conditions to tell what each scallop experienced when they were tiny, vulnerable larvae. </div><div><br /></div><div>My team still has a lot of work to do in developing our proposal, but I'm excited for the process. With any luck, we'll have a fun scallop project to do soon!</div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-24542830004421052322023-09-20T13:01:00.002-04:002023-09-20T13:01:47.348-04:00Name that zoea!<div style="text-align: left;">Friends, it has been a productive few weeks over in my corner of the world. I'm busy at the microscope, sorting and identifying zooplankton from the Gulf of Mexico.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLpf07xM7rlKHv_N8BuZ0Fu0ao8wn6bfsId5k6QzZwrv-i-7N8rkHWJmevQBLcxGMT7UL5G_zGHvQyXvVqKqARKBBxNe5C-HR65FSafDFWndmWU45VecTnocmdmgQSGNCPhHmSdxTwi8h5c5svGU00y3dXm_QVje7MmQ-NLZVnskTTqNl_S8hkRUuUUO8a/s2789/Giant%20zoea%20GoM-2022-6%200.8x_crop.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1542" data-original-width="2789" height="177" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLpf07xM7rlKHv_N8BuZ0Fu0ao8wn6bfsId5k6QzZwrv-i-7N8rkHWJmevQBLcxGMT7UL5G_zGHvQyXvVqKqARKBBxNe5C-HR65FSafDFWndmWU45VecTnocmdmgQSGNCPhHmSdxTwi8h5c5svGU00y3dXm_QVje7MmQ-NLZVnskTTqNl_S8hkRUuUUO8a/s320/Giant%20zoea%20GoM-2022-6%200.8x_crop.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">This zoea larva came from one of my plankton samples.</span><br style="font-size: small;" /><span style="font-size: small;">Check out that spike! Long spines and spikes help protect</span><br style="font-size: small;" /><span style="font-size: small;">plankton from predators. </span></td></tr></tbody></table></div><div style="text-align: left;">Last summer, I was <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ox-sWBcKhY8" target="_blank">part of a team</a> investigating <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/06/mystery-in-mesophotic.html" target="_blank">shipwrecks</a> and natural hard-bottom reefs in the mesophotic zone, between 50 and 200 m deep. Recently, I've waded my way through all the ROV video we collected and found magnificent species <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/08/name-that-fish.html" target="_blank">of fish</a> <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/09/name-that-coral.html" target="_blank">and corals</a> along the way. The next step is to analyze <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/06/cp-baker.html" target="_blank">plankton samples</a> I collected when we were at sea. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I wasn't quite sure what would be in the plankton samples or what they would show. I've been curious for a while about how <a href="https://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2018/09/the-voyage-of-dawn-treader-part-5.html" target="_blank">animals disperse</a> to shipwrecks as larvae, so I thought that plankton samples collected from the water column right above shipwrecks might offer some clues. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Take a guess: Am I finding larvae of the corals and worms that inhabit the shipwrecks on the seafloor below? Am I finding something completely different? Or am I finding nothing at all? </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjx7herRfGFRe4n1A7MqtpFo289MLp66oDLH9sWVO18H6QgyWBYnV170vqAi6KArbsJjhZupteOor2z8WVUkKo0ihIZV4X04cMWpeW3vsr60Ul1ZVlaCfclSYbzFUKImVQEdU8dhc86oXh1qDpFDBUTGoeVvIGJqNWscG1sUFC-YOVAeLqQdpdbRNAKGAPq/s2562/Megalopa%20armstrong%20GoM-2022-7%202x%20(1)_edit.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; display: inline !important; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2562" data-original-width="2556" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjx7herRfGFRe4n1A7MqtpFo289MLp66oDLH9sWVO18H6QgyWBYnV170vqAi6KArbsJjhZupteOor2z8WVUkKo0ihIZV4X04cMWpeW3vsr60Ul1ZVlaCfclSYbzFUKImVQEdU8dhc86oXh1qDpFDBUTGoeVvIGJqNWscG1sUFC-YOVAeLqQdpdbRNAKGAPq/w199-h200/Megalopa%20armstrong%20GoM-2022-7%202x%20(1)_edit.jpg" width="199" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">This megalopa larva is just about <br />ready to settle on the seafloor <br />and become a juvenile crab. </span></td></tr></tbody></table>If you selected the second option, you're correct! The larvae I have been finding in my plankton samples are completely different species from what lives on the shipwrecks. I know because the shipwrecks were dominated by cnidarians - stony corals, wire corals, and hydroids - and had tons of bearded fireworms, which eat cnidarians. My larvae in plankton samples are all crustaceans - mostly crab larvae. The two sets of species are totally different! </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Don't ask me why the species living on the shipwrecks and dispersing in the water above them are so different, because I have no clue yet. This is the exciting part of research: finding an unexpected pattern and learning something new about the world. I'm very excited to see what the plankton samples reveal!<br /></div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-74747090191349482972023-09-01T17:30:00.001-04:002023-09-01T17:30:31.136-04:00Name that coral!<div style="text-align: left;">I am back at it - analyzing all the video footage my team collected from the <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/11/wrecks-of-semi-deep.html" target="_blank">Gulf of Mexico</a> last summer. I finished the <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/08/name-that-fish.html" target="_blank">fish already</a>, so now I feel more at home: I am identifying the <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2018/01/long-live-polar-invertebrates.html" target="_blank">invertebrates</a>. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlmkO1aIw-bxe0EZSJbD_Urb99rxOIBIZwva40FxrURqIKmCHxU6BqNF2YmCO-SAMfOam7MxVWgA53DEqkWcaeq0LZ1LQ_uRbGBrVTWWdJPwuwk2J9PxanOqsR92j1DtJZ3BwuSBIQJYS_8wW6iMKEqa8TBPkwg2Mo6gT_e4RsHWT_QMV917OWMcyQPkFD/s2295/vlcsnap-2023-08-06-21h31m26s539.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2160" data-original-width="2295" height="301" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlmkO1aIw-bxe0EZSJbD_Urb99rxOIBIZwva40FxrURqIKmCHxU6BqNF2YmCO-SAMfOam7MxVWgA53DEqkWcaeq0LZ1LQ_uRbGBrVTWWdJPwuwk2J9PxanOqsR92j1DtJZ3BwuSBIQJYS_8wW6iMKEqa8TBPkwg2Mo6gT_e4RsHWT_QMV917OWMcyQPkFD/s320/vlcsnap-2023-08-06-21h31m26s539.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">This frame grab from our <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/06/mystery-in-mesophotic.html" target="_blank">mystery shipwreck</a> shows cup corals<br />(<i>Tubastrea coccinea</i>) and sea rods (<i>Diodogorgia nodulifera</i>)</span>.</td></tr></tbody></table>Many of the engineers at WHOI subscribe to a 3-part taxonomic system. Having little knowledge of the living creatures in the wide, watery world, the engineers classify objects they observe in the ocean into three categories. An object is either a rock, a shark, or snot. That's right - all inanimate objects are termed "rocks," all swimming animals are called "sharks," and the rest gets described as "snot." I didn't say it was a good system, mind you. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I suppose under the rock-shark-snot worldview, all the <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2017/05/mystery-blob.html" target="_blank">sessile invertebrates</a> that I love so much fall into the "snot" category. To be fair, they are a <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/04/spawning-in-air.html" target="_blank">bit slimy</a> sometimes. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">This week, I have had the pleasure of identifying all that "snot" from the Gulf of Mexico to species. So far, I have seen stony corals and wire corals and cup corals and octocorals - every type of coral imaginable. There have also been sponges, bryozoans, and bearded fireworms galore. The <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/06/the-hamlet.html" target="_blank">mesophotic zone</a> tends to have lower species richness than shallower depths, but I am finding no shortage of beautiful creatures to keep me occupied. <br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">It's very satisfying to see our footage from last summer being converted into numeric data. Soon, I should be able to run some statistical analyses! </div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-87100424222135157412023-08-25T16:48:00.002-04:002023-08-25T16:48:23.483-04:00CATAIN lives!<div style="text-align: left;">It's always a good day when I open my email to a <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/03/sitrep.html" target="_blank">message from the field</a>. Kharis is in Svalbard right now, so I've been watching my email for updates. She's sent me periodic communications about sample collection, sorting larvae, and life at the research station. Aside from the normal <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2014/09/foiled-by-navy.html" target="_blank">ups-and-downs</a> of field work, everything is going pretty well. Except for one thing: CATAIN. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7RBQ9YxP_KDaopF5P4ETEpwTJ1Q_riT8aaSKdzMi9DM9KEvoIN5fZbvDuzaHUWwcZde-QVol8ty7tTsGF4DUwCFaljkPll2Skp26ord71sZWMGR7A4TChLuKHSxImerbdCDRmFdjZU2kh7_nGtnAH7n4T2EJ9t7XDSGWM1htfZCfyJjY_79XGy_52wS5v/s1350/Teisten.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="908" data-original-width="1350" height="215" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7RBQ9YxP_KDaopF5P4ETEpwTJ1Q_riT8aaSKdzMi9DM9KEvoIN5fZbvDuzaHUWwcZde-QVol8ty7tTsGF4DUwCFaljkPll2Skp26ord71sZWMGR7A4TChLuKHSxImerbdCDRmFdjZU2kh7_nGtnAH7n4T2EJ9t7XDSGWM1htfZCfyJjY_79XGy_52wS5v/s320/Teisten.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">CATAIN being lifted out of the fjord by R/V <i>Teisten</i>. <br />Photo by Kharis Schrage.</span></td></tr></tbody></table>We <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/01/catain-day.html" target="_blank">deployed CATAIN</a> on the seafloor in Kongsfjorden last January, and Kharis was tasked with recovering it this trip. She learned how t<span style="font-family: inherit;">o operate our <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2023/07/rov-lobstermoose-part-2.html" target="_blank">lab's ROV</a> for the recovery operation. She flew all the way up to Ny-Ålesund, Svalbard. She went out on the Kings Bay research boat, </span><i><span style="font-family: inherit;">Teis</span>ten</i>. And...no dice.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Kongsfjorden is very different in the summer compared to the winter. In the winter, the water is crystal clear, even if it is <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2020/01/aurora.html" target="_blank">dark out</a> all day. In the summer, though, the glaciers release turbid water into the fjord. According to Kharis, there were whole patches of the fjord where the water was red. Operating the ROV in this high-turbidity environment proved an extreme challenge because the ROV couldn't see a thing. For Kharis on board <i>Teisten</i>, with just 15 m of water between her and the camera, the turbulent water turned out to be an impossible barrier. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">We talked through different search strategies over Zoom. We weighed our options if we couldn't find CATAIN during her trip. We even considered the possibility that the camera might have been scraped away by sea ice in the last 8 months. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4Rz7oV8XVIeVVbw0Mqs4RlPiNhgBr_AkKcvZKEXwVqMn3vVor6cGCHxlqdZ0LyEGy2vjLbHQM4puFX7XQa0I0SBipFZCsHr-PxYAZFDgUrwoao5eCC0B5u3ndHK3yVqW3oJ6U7mO5mQ4BjxZRwvAgJEsWq5zYeldrRtTAZvCion_ajVXiuVI8JH-FLG19/s5472/2023-08-10-13-08-36_512.00ms.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3648" data-original-width="5472" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4Rz7oV8XVIeVVbw0Mqs4RlPiNhgBr_AkKcvZKEXwVqMn3vVor6cGCHxlqdZ0LyEGy2vjLbHQM4puFX7XQa0I0SBipFZCsHr-PxYAZFDgUrwoao5eCC0B5u3ndHK3yVqW3oJ6U7mO5mQ4BjxZRwvAgJEsWq5zYeldrRtTAZvCion_ajVXiuVI8JH-FLG19/s320/2023-08-10-13-08-36_512.00ms.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">One of the photos CATAIN captured. Look at the barnacles!</span></td></tr></tbody></table>And then it came: the victorious email from Kharis. "It's up!" read the subject line. Kharis's message had very little content - she must have sent the email before even opening CATAIN's housing. In subsequent messages, she told me the camera had worked, the batteries looked barely used, and the data were downloaded to her laptop. I was excited beyond belief. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div>By the time CATAIN was recovered, Kharis had only one more day left at the research station. She quickly charged the batteries, sealed CATAIN's housing, and checked its seal by pulling a vacuum. The good news is that deploying equipment in the ocean is always easier than recovering it - just go to the spot, lower it over the side, and you're done. <div><br /></div><div>CATAIN has been returned to her rightful place on the seafloor, at 15 m in Kongsfjorden. We will be back for one more recovery next spring. I'm very excited to see the data that CATAIN will collect!</div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6410938610813670483.post-90845839364350793872023-08-18T12:34:00.001-04:002023-08-18T12:39:07.418-04:00Name that fish!<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0C3a0JVhX77jLwcL0J-8BG2WyGNYSRyjSuWGelOCp1CR72_AtWsvLmNxBgHRWYuBPMOCFdlPuRIQJBbx95bbgbV1IdINt79_jHr9ha0Y2WPnOlAEYyrvQeQABk0i7Cth5ahGhnNr3_BPBCOhkhLwdD90k4kVFcgg_0FeHRyxIwYYmx96gw83RMGJj-7Rh/s3840/vlcsnap-2023-07-25-10h37m19s343.png" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2160" data-original-width="3840" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0C3a0JVhX77jLwcL0J-8BG2WyGNYSRyjSuWGelOCp1CR72_AtWsvLmNxBgHRWYuBPMOCFdlPuRIQJBbx95bbgbV1IdINt79_jHr9ha0Y2WPnOlAEYyrvQeQABk0i7Cth5ahGhnNr3_BPBCOhkhLwdD90k4kVFcgg_0FeHRyxIwYYmx96gw83RMGJj-7Rh/s320/vlcsnap-2023-07-25-10h37m19s343.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">A frame grab from my Gulf of Mexico video. Can you name<br />the different fish?</span></td></tr></tbody></table>If science was a game show, it would take place in Japan. Japanese game shows are ridiculous - you know what I'm talking about. Contestants have to hold an orange between their chin and their chest and transfer it to another contestant, all while standing on a wobbly rotating platform. Or they slide through a tunnel of slime while a fan blows glitter on their faces to reach the prize: a golden banana. The combinations of elements don't even make sense, but the audiences are always super invested in the contestants' success. If you don't know what I'm talking about, just do an online search for <i>Takeshi's Castle</i>.<div><br /></div><div>I don't (usually) have a live audience when I'm science-ing, but it can feel like a ridiculous challenge nonetheless. The game show I'm playing this week is called <i>Name that Fish!</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div>I'm going through all the video we recorded using a <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/06/shakedown.html" target="_blank">remotely-operated vehicle</a> from the Gulf of Mexico last summer. Working at <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/06/mystery-in-mesophotic.html" target="_blank">mesophotic depths</a>, our team surveyed <a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/06/wreck-and-boulder-patch.html" target="_blank">shipwrecks and paired natural</a> hard-bottom habitats to learn about their history and biology. It's honestly my dream study design because I get to do one-on-one comparisons of shipwrecks and natural reefs. </div><div><br /></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I started with the fish. As I watched the videos, I scribbled general diagrams of each species and tallied the number of individuals I saw. I took frame grabs from the video anytime I saw a new species. Then I went back through the frame grabs to identify each of them. It took several days, a comprehensive reference book, an illustrated poster, advice from a friend, and the internet to get a set of species names that I trusted. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfcPdIt1HqWuEmJiz00XRCk0SR3EdrnLtih6lOitoS3pJ0Cx9Fsey7ghcvj4E4cqyyKsllE0rPjOvssIMJKMlcduyJ1pSpcPEpXwYRycELNNWVdPLN_z342szLNG9CvtSedaCQ06e0KfAt5HMbFUKO6RZ31G0BjBf3_rv1qVErfIDqhRfo5iAilkcl6BPh/s1683/vlcsnap-2023-08-09-20h26m30s943.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1188" data-original-width="1683" height="141" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfcPdIt1HqWuEmJiz00XRCk0SR3EdrnLtih6lOitoS3pJ0Cx9Fsey7ghcvj4E4cqyyKsllE0rPjOvssIMJKMlcduyJ1pSpcPEpXwYRycELNNWVdPLN_z342szLNG9CvtSedaCQ06e0KfAt5HMbFUKO6RZ31G0BjBf3_rv1qVErfIDqhRfo5iAilkcl6BPh/w200-h141/vlcsnap-2023-08-09-20h26m30s943.png" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Atlantic spadefish, <i>Chaetodipterus faber</i></span></td></tr></tbody></table>Check out the frame grab at the top, from our dive on the <i><a href="http://kirstinmeyer.blogspot.com/2022/06/cp-baker.html" target="_blank">CP Baker</a></i>. The big fish is obvious - that's an amberjack, <i>Seriola dumerili</i>. Can you identify the small black fish swarming around that coral head? How about the pale fish in the background with the dark tails? You might find yourself squinting at the screen, enlarging the photo with your fingers on the mousepad, flipping furiously through a book to find the right chapter, or becoming a true game show contestant and phoning a friend. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I'll give you a hint: the tiny black fish around the coral head are not native to the Gulf of Mexico. It took me at least three false IDs to figure that one out. I could tell by the shape that it was a damselfish, but its coloration and that conspicuous white spot did not match to any damselfish in my ID book. So I asked the internet, and sure enough, within a few clicks, I had found the regal demoiselle, <i>Neopomacentrus cyanomos</i>, native to the Indo-Pacific and introduced to the Gulf of Mexico. Success.</div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">It's been a lot of work but also a lot of fun to identify all my fish. If this were really a game show, I'd probably be going home with some prize money!</div>Kirstin Meyer-Kaiserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03540717865900794249noreply@blogger.com0