deep-sea mining – Page 14 – Southern Fried Science

Climate change denial, open-science hardware, some missing pink dolphins, and more! Monday Morning Salvage: May 1, 2017

May 1, 2017April 30, 2017 Andrew Thaler

Weekly Salvage

Fog Horn (A Call to Action)

Are you represented by a climate change denier? Motherboard has put together this amazing guide to every climate change denier in congress. Check your state and give your congressperson a piece of your mind. Congressman Andy Harris may be sick of hearing from me, but I guarantee he’ll be gone from my district long before I am.

Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)

Deep-sea Disco, Giant Icebergs, Pokémon Go, and more! Monday Morning Salvage: April 24, 2017

April 24, 2017 Andrew Thaler

Weekly Salvage

Fog Horn (A Call to Action)

Still time! The EPA is seeking public input on the new administrations approach to environmental regulations. They are required to seek public input. They are required to respond to public input. Go tell them how you feel. Public comments close May 15. Here’s the docket with instructions on how to comment: Evaluation of Existing Regulations.

Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)

This deep-sea mining Disco video is something.

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

Titanic tourists, nodule mining, right whales, and more! The Monday Morning Salvage: April 17, 2017

April 17, 2017April 16, 2017 Andrew Thaler

Weekly Salvage

Fog Horn (A Call to Action)

The EPA is seeking public input on the new administrations approach to environmental regulations. They are required to seek public input. They are required to respond to public input. Go tell them how you feel. Public comments close May 15. Here’s the docket with instructions on how to comment: Evaluation of Existing Regulations.

Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)

Titanic Tourism. Like this article: To Visit Titanic Firsthand, New York Banker Dives Deep Into Wallet. I have thoughts. Oh so many thoughts.

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

Deep-sea mining meets alternative energy: Renewables’ deep-sea mining conundrum. I once calculated that all the copper in Solwara 1 could make 800 1-megawatt wind turbines [note: I am not good at math].
Two really cool expeditions coming out of Louisiana this year: Exploring Changes on the Gulf Coast and Ecology of Shallow Wood Falls. Neat!
Begun, the crab wars have. Svalbard’s Snow Crabs: a Pincered Proxy for Arctic Oil.
A wonderful piece on field notes and what they mean to past a future fisheries biologists from our friends at the Fisheries Blog.
A tiny Iowa paper just won a Pulitzer Prize for tackling farm pollution. This mouse roars.
Farm-raised superbugs find their way into kids’ noses somehow. This is fine. Every thing is fine.

Octopus Genes, Decolonization, and a mega-dose of Citizen Science! Monday Morning Salvage: April 10, 2017

April 10, 2017April 10, 2017 Andrew Thaler

Weekly Salvage

Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)

Octopuses are weird. Really, really weird. Ed Yong covers yet another weird octopus thing in the Atlantic: Octopuses Do Something Really Strange to Their Genes. And check out the original paper, below.

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

This interview with Shay Akil McLean is one of the best introductions to the concept of decolonizing science: Hood Biologist Explains How to Decolonize All The Science. See also: We Need Decolonial Scientists.
Free Radicals is one of the best new(ish) science blogs on the net: Zapatistas Reimagine Science as Tool of Resistance.
Incidentally, the March for Science does not have a diversity problem.

Instead, I believe that this march needs to be completely apolitical and nonpartisan. I think that we should protest the current administration, which wants to repeal laws guaranteeing clean air and water, claim that climate change is a hoax, and remove scientists’ access to quality healthcare, but in a way that doesn’t alienate members of the current administration. We should demand change, but vaguely, and from no one in particular.

Source.

If you love geophysical fluid dynamics, then you will love these foamy streaks in a lagoon. Deep Sea News, natch.
With the legendary Erika Bergman at the helm, the Aquatica Submarine crew put eyes on a new glass sponge bioherm off the coast of Vancouver.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6stLjJ5lAo

Another article about the GOSH meeting where I rep-ed OpenROV and Oceanography for Everyone: Santiago de Chile, capital of the Global network for Open Science Hardware.
As a card-carrying population geneticist, I second this piece: Getting your genetic disease risks from 23andme is probably a terrible idea.

Meteor hunters, deep divers, and ocean action! Monday Morning Salvage: April 3, 2017

April 3, 2017 Andrew Thaler

Weekly Salvage

Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)

Have you ever wanted to hunt for meteorites in the Great Lakes using underwater robots? Yes? Well, guess what? Now you can! Join along with the ROV Meteorite Hunt on OpenExplorer!
If the Great Lakes are a little too chilly for you, maybe consider joining SFS Super Fan Joey Meier and his students at Polk State on their journey to Guadalupe!

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

“When we left the beach…” Monday Morning Salvage: March 20, 2017

March 20, 2017 Andrew Thaler

Weekly Salvage

Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)

The poetry of Derek Walcott.

Nobel laureate, poet, and perhaps the finest English-language writer of any generation, died this weekend. His poetry, particularly the epic poem Omeros, which draws upon the themes of Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey to tell the story of colonization, imperialism, slavery, and humanity’;s relationship to the sea over more than 8000 lines.
If you’re new to the poetry of Derek Walcott, The Sea is History is a great place to start and the New York Times published a short selection of his poetry: The Pages of the Sea.

Monday Morning Salvage: February 20, 2017

February 20, 2017 Andrew Thaler 1 Comment

Weekly Salvage

For all our US-based Readers: Happy President’s Day! For everyone else, this is the reason none of you USian colleagues are answering e-mails. Unless they are, in which case, *grumble grumble grumble* *something about work-life balance*

Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)

The ocean is full of garbage and even the deepest trenches aren’t safe. Here’s an interview I did with KSPN Saipan where I talked about the garbage the precedes us everywhere we go.

Also: Banned chemicals persist in deep ocean. This seems important.

Monday Morning Salvage: February 6, 2017

February 6, 2017 Andrew Thaler

Uncategorized

Bringing you the best of marine science and conservation from the last week.

Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)

The ridiculous, extensible jaw and neck joint of a Barbeled Dragonfish.

Deep-Sea Fishes That Are Built to Eat Big.

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

Monday Morning Salvage: January 2, 2017

January 2, 2017January 1, 2017 Andrew Thaler

Weekly Salvage

Welcome to 2017 and the ninth year of marine science and conservation at Southern Fried Science!

Flotsam (what we’re obsessed with right now)

Alex Warneke knows exactly how to push all of my ocean outreach buttons: Low-cost teaching tools? Check! Hands on student engagement? Check! Open-source materials and datasets? Check! 3D Printing? Check! Meet 3D Cabrillo:

Learn more about this awesome project from the National Park Service: How to Build a Better Biomodel.

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

The environmental impact of biomining the deep sea.

January 20, 2016January 19, 2016 Andrew Thaler

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On January 1, 2016, the Southern Fried Science central server began uploading blog posts apparently circa 2041. Due to a related corruption of the contemporary database, we are, at this time, unable to remove these Field Notes from the Future or prevent the uploading of additional posts. Please enjoy this glimpse into the ocean future while we attempt to rectify the situation.

Diversity is resilience.

Or so deep-sea mining newcomer Aronnax Environmental wants you to believe. Arronax will be the first new novel-compound biomining operation to make the dive in almost a decade. The high cost of entry and the onerous permitting process has made competition in the high seas practically non-existent for the big six.

Aronnax enters the game as the “sustainable alternative to destructive biomining”. They claim that their proprietary process is kinder to the seafloor and allows recruitment and recovery following each pass of the mining tool–which they call a swath. The machine itself is a sifter, rather than a dozer, which allows for the collection of environmental DNA while minimizing disturbance to the seafloor. Sifter technology is, in theory, designed to maximize biotic retention, protecting local biodiversity while still achieving 95% comprehensive sampling.

At least, that’s what Aronnax hopes.