ROV | Southern Fried Science

Protecting the Iron Snail, more then meets the eye, ROV-bot in disguise, saying farewell to a glacier, and more! Monday Morning Salvage: July 29, 2019.

Posted on 17 Days Ago by Andrew David Thaler

Foghorn (A Call to Action!)

For US Citizens: Call your representatives and demand Impeachment Hearings. Now. It is, in point of fact, the absolute least you can do.

Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)

I can’t speak to the practicality of this beyond a few very niche applications, but it is still awesome. Aquanaut, an autonomous submarine that transforms into a humanoid robot.

Scientists Just Discovered a 310-Mile Coral Reef Corridor in the Gulf of Mexico.
The Trek to Bid Farewell to an Icelandic Glacier: A plaque will soon mark the site of Okjökull, one of Iceland’s dearly departed.

The copper plaque will be installed on Ok in August 2019. COURTESY RICE UNIVERSITY.

LarvaBots, turning the tide on captive dolphins, horror fish from the deep sea, ARA San Juan found, and more! Monday Morning Salvage: November 19, 2018.

Posted on November 19 by Andrew David Thaler

Foghorn (A Call to Action!)

Congratulations to Dr. Hal Holmes of Conservation X Labs for earning a Moore Foundation Inventor Fellowship for his DNA Barcode Project.

Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)

Reef RangerBot becomes ‘LarvalBot’ to spread coral babies.

LarvalBot gently squirts the coral larvae onto damaged reef areas. Credit: QUT Media

Turn of the tide: Seeing dolphins differently by National Aquarium Director John Racanelli.

Coral reefs lose their champion, which laptop is really the greenest, new sea slugs, and an octopuses garden in the sea. Monday Morning Salvage: November 5, 2018.

Posted on November 5 by Andrew David Thaler

Foghorn (A Call to Action!)

Help the Victims of Typhoon Yutu.
Ruth Gates dedicated her life to saving the world’s reefs and training the next generation of reef scientists. The Fight for Corals Loses Its Great Champion.

Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)

Scientists Have Just Named 17 New Sea Slug Species, and They’re All Fabulous.

The newest members of the nudibranch family. (H. iba comes in 2 color morphs.)
Photo: California Academy of Sciences

A close-up photo of the sponge that is being studied. NHM.

I made a ridiculous Glowing Wall Mount for my OpenROV Trident!

Posted on October 26 by Andrew David Thaler

Because OpenROV Trident is a work of art and should be displayed as such when not on deployment. This was my first big design project using the Glowforge and integrating LED strips

If you have a Trident, you can download the plans and bill of materials right here: OpenROV Trident Glowing Wall Mount.

More importantly, if you don’t have a Trident, allow me to direct you to the SEE Initiative. OpenROV and National Geographic are giving away 1000 free Tridents to scientists, educators, and explorers. Apply today and let’s have an adventure together!

Science as graphic novel, baby eels, anglerfish emoji, drone ocean rescue, and more! Monday Morning Salvage: January 22, 2018.

Posted on January 22, 2018 by Andrew David Thaler

Fog Horn (A Call to Action)

The US Government is shut down. This is not great news for science (at the moment, my project to train ROV technicians and deliver 5 – 10 observation-class underwater robots to the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands is on hold pending resolution). Call you congressperson and give them an earful. Call you senator and give them an earful.

Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)

Women Writing About the Wild: 25 Essential Authors: A primer on who to start reading and who you’ve been overlooking for too long.

Nan Shepherd. (Wikimedia Commons)

This paper: Managing marine socio-ecological systems: picturing the future, which, holy mola, is written in graphic novel format!

Managing marine socio-ecological systems: picturing the future.

Parasitic barnacles, a code of conduct for marine conservation, #BillMeetScienceTwitter, and more! Monday Morning Salvage: May 22, 2017.

Posted on May 22, 2017 by Andrew David Thaler

Fog Horn (A Call to Action)

27 National Monuments are under review by the Department of the Interior. Our Nation Monuments are our National Treasures. Don’t let them be sold to the highest bidder! Submit formal public comments on the DOI Monument Review and make your voice heard.

Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)

This parasitic barnacle, Sacculina carcini, replacing the reproductive organs of a crab.

Hat tip to Tommy Leung, who’s twitter feed is a gold mine of fantastic parasites and where to find them.
#BillMeetScienceTwitter. What started as an inquiry into whether science celebrities really engage with practicing scientists on a regular basic morphed into the best way to find new scientists to follow on Twitter. I’m curating a massive list of all the self-identified Ocean Scientists that participated.

Jetsam (what we’re enjoying from around the web)

Deep-sea mining is gearing up on the high seas, and international regulations is still lagging far behind technology: The Wild West of Deep-Sea Mining.
oceanbites rolls out an excellent overview of the different kinds of robots used in conducting deep-sea research.
Beyond drug lords and conservationists: Who is missing in the coverage of the vaquita’s demise? from the legendary team at Deep Sea News.
Henderson Island is isolated and uninhabited, so why are all its beaches so completely covered in garbage? Spoilers: It’s because the planet is an interconnected global system with impacts felt far beyond the source of insult.
Bone-eating snot flower worm will never not be my favorite common name. Tiny Zombie Worms Are the Beavers of the Deep.
The history of the entire world, in one entertaining YouTube video (via Vox):

Are Ships The Careless Giants Of The Sea? Yes, but they don’t have to be.
Trump’s EPA Greenlights a Nasty Chemical. A Month Later, It Poisons a Bunch of Farmworkers.
Trump country is flooding, and climate ideas are shifting.
The Ocean as the New Frontier of Climate Action.
The Antarctic Peninsula is 3 degrees warming than is used to be, and that means plants are growing and Antarctica is getting greener.
The long history of ocean drilling and scientific discovery.
A tiny anchovy could be a silver bullet for malnutrition in Peru—if only we would let it: The Fish that Smells like Money.
I talk alot about e-waste and disposable electronics, which is why I’m excited to see modular, open-source smartphone projects finally start to mature. The ZeroPhone looks like on of the most promising additions to this space.
Skeptic Magazine has a pseudoscience problems. Unfortunately, this time it’s the skeptics promoting some pretty eyebrow-raising junk science. I went a little deeper into this on Twitter.

Ocean Kickstarter of the Month: New Robot to Explore the Depths of Yellowstone Lake

Posted on April 14, 2016 by Andrew David Thaler

We are engineers and explorers who plan to help Yellowstone scientists make what could be tomorrow’s greatest discoveries.

New Robot to Explore the Depths of Yellowstone Lake

The Global Foundation for Ocean Exploration is a non-profit engineering group that designs and builds robots to explore the world’s oceans and large lakes. They are trying to build Yogi, a small research ROV to explore the depths of Yellowstone Lake in Yellowstone National Park. Yellowstone Lake is a fascinating water body, with hydrothermal vents similar to the deep-sea vents that my primary research focuses on.

I’ll let them explain why this project is so cool:

Why explore Yellowstone Lake?

Yellowstone started a proud tradition of protecting our planet’s most unique environments when it became the world’s first National Park more than a century ago. However, there is a part of Yellowstone that very few people have visited. An entire ecosystem that is hidden from us at the surface. A place that scientists are eager to study and may harbor unknown life; the depths of Yellowstone Lake.

We now know that the bottom of the Lake is far from barren, hosting species of crustaceans, sponges, and even small creatures that feed off of the Earth’s heat and chemistry rather than the Sun. ‘Thermophilic’ (or hot water-loving) microbes thrive in the relatively high-temperatures immediately surrounding active thermal features at the bottom of the Lake and scattered throughout Yellowstone Park. These creatures may be microscopic but they have the potential to profoundly influence the medical and biological sciences.

New Robot to Explore the Depths of Yellowstone Lake

Onward to the Ocean Kickstarter Criteria! Read More

Keeping your robot invasions under control.

Posted on September 28, 2015 by Andrew David Thaler

It’s been a big week for papers here at Southern Fried Science. This morning, Amy, myself, William (of Bomai Cruz fame), and Dominik and Erika of OpenROV published our guidelines on minimizing the potential for microROVs to act as invasive species vectors in Tropical Conservation Science. The abstract:

Remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) present a potential risk for the transmission of invasive species. This is particularly the case for small, low-cost microROVs that can be easily transported among ecosystems and, if not properly cleaned and treated, may introduce novel species into new regions. Here we present a set of 5 best-practice guidelines to reduce the risk of marine invasive species introduction for microROV operators. These guidelines include: educating ROV users about the causes and potential harm of species invasion; visually inspecting ROVs prior to and at the conclusion of each dive; rinsing ROVs in sterile freshwater following each dive; washing ROVs in a mild bleach (or other sanitizing agent) solution before moving between discrete geographic regions or ecosystems; and minimizing transport between ecosystems. We also provide a checklist that microROV users can incorporate into their pre- and post-dive maintenance
routine.

Read the whole, open-access paper over at TCS!

Robots as vectors for marine invasions: best practices for minimizing transmission of invasive species via observation-class ROVs.

Bring the trench to the bench or bring the bench to the trench? The future of deep-sea exploration

Posted on January 15, 2013 by Andrew David Thaler

AndrewThumb Newsweek, in is new and impressive digital format, released a series of articles this week on deep-sea exploration, the challenges of human occupied and remotely-operated vehicles, and the decline in funding for ocean science, particularly in the deep sea. The main article, The Last Dive? Funding for Human Expeditions in the Ocean May Have Run Aground, is a deep, detailed look at the state of deep-sea science, seen through the eyes of Dr. Sylvia Earle and Dr. Robert Ballard, two giants in the ocean community. The follow-up, James Cameron Responds to Robert Ballard on Deep-Sea Exploration, provides insight into the mind of James Cameron, who last year successfully dove the Challenger Deep in his own deep-sea submersible.

Both the articles continue to perpetrate the canard that there is a deep chasm between the human-occupied submersible (HOV) and remotely-operated vehicle (ROV) communities. The reality is that deep-sea scientists use a variety of tools, from mechanical samplers to autonomous robots, to study and understand the deep. The choice comes down to which tool is most efficient, least expensive, and currently available. Absent a sea change, ROV’s will continue to be the workhorses of deep-sea research. And that is a good thing. I sang the praise of my robot underlings the last time this debate breached the public consciousness. I also discussed why basic deep-sea research and training highly skilled ROV pilots is a matter of national security.

A revolution in underwater exploration for everyone: the open source underwater robot

Posted on June 29, 2012 by Andrew David Thaler

If you’ve been following me on twitter, checking out some of my YouTube videos, or reading this blog, you probably have a good sense about how enthusiastic I am about ROV’s and how excited I am about the current wave of cheap, easy to build and maintain, functional ROV’s for outreach, teaching, and recreational exploration. Inexpensive, high quality ROV’s can provide us with previously unheard of access to the ocean.

So I’m really excited that OpenROV, an open source project to develop a robotic submarine that anyone can build and use, has launched their kickstarter page to develop and distribute the OpenROV kit. From the project page: