The sea floor through human eyes under bright submersible lights

Justin was part of an international team of scientists that took place in the US NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration's Operation Deep Scope.

'One of the mission objectives for NOAA’s Office of Ocean Exploration is the characterization of benthic (bottom) and pelagic (water column) habitats and ecosystems.

This has proven to be a great challenge in the deep-sea environment, as many of the large predators flee from noisy, brightly lit submersibles. In addition to the temporary disruption of normal behavior, animals with photoreceptors designed for the dimly lit deep-sea environment may be permanently blinded by the very lights we use to find them.

Looking at the deep-sea through human eyes may also have affected description of animal interactions, since animals that may be transparent, and therefore virtually invisible to humans under bright submersible lights, may be much more visible to animals with polarization and/or UV sensitivity.

Operation Deep-Scope 2004 looked into the deep ocean with new eyes and made an astonishing array of discoveries in a very short time, including the discovery of a fluorescent shark, the fluorescence of methane hydrates, and the discovery of a new species of large deep-sea squid.

The Eye in the Sea camera
attached to the front of the sub

Operation Deep-Scope 2005 brings together the same international team of scientists, utilizing even more methods of seeing and collecting. Using advanced technology, they continue to study these hidden depths, deploying the unobstrusive Eye in the Sea camera for 24 hours, using a variety of cameras and filters during dives with the Johnson-Sea-Link submersible to study polarization and fluorescence in the deep-sea environment, and utilizing new collection techniques to collect live deep-sea species for study in shipboard labs.'

From NOAA Ocean Explorer.

Diving with no bottom
Any scuba diver knows the slightly uneasy feeling of having to descend to a bottom that is out of sight due to poor visibility. Try looking down in crystalline conditions of 200ft visibility, still not seeing the ocean floor and indeed knowing that the bottom is half a mile below. Unease turns to awe as we embrace the experience of blue water diving and the ocean embraces us. This is one of those moments to leave you feeling very small and yet eager for more.

We are not doing this for the wow-factor, however. We are here as four floating specks in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico, four planktonic biologists trying to understand life in a world with no edges and no background. Through careful planning and with safety uppermost in mind, we are not like the real plankton that drifts past but are tethered to the support boat with climbing rope and a toilet flange - the toiletary-trapeze.

The task for this underwater circus is to collect and film marine zooplankton and begin to understand how they live in this blue, blue habitat with nothing to hide behind. The result through evolution, or the hand of God - however you want to see it - is transparency. One way to hide here is to make your body totally see-through and, while difficult, several types of animals including vertebrates, mollusks, crustaceans and worms have managed it. Only the gut and the eyes can't be made transparent and these are often silvered on the outside instead in order to reflect the local blue of the ocean and also disappear.

The gut and outline of an otherwise
invisible jellyfish.

The result then is a cross between the invisible man and "Predator" and indeed this mix of aggression and subterfuge is the reason for these remarkable camouflage strategies.

So - we know how they disappear. What we are working on is how this cunning camouflage is broken and animals revealed for food and sex? Click here to view Justin's entire log and experience a blue water dive with the scientists through underwater video footage.