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Sub to explore undersea islands
By Sandra Dibble
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
August 23, 2008
Dark underwater mountains rise off the coast of Baja California Sur, too deep for scuba divers and virtually unexplored. This week, scientists began diving hundreds of feet beneath the surface of the Gulf of California, searching for new species and insights that could help protect the region's commercial fisheries.
“We know less about this area than we know about the surface of Mars,†said Exequiel Ezcurra, the leader of the expedition that began yesterday and ends Sept. 5. Ezcurra is provost and director of the Biodiversity Research Center of the Californias at the San Diego Natural History Museum.
From whale sharks to giant manta rays to bottlenose dolphin, scientists have long documented the variety of life that thrives in Mexico's Gulf of California. But little is known about areas farther below on seamounts and deep-sea reefs.
The dozen scientists participating in the project are taking turns inside a tiny yellow submarine with a robotic arm and 360-degree view, collecting samples and taking photographs and videos to document the world sometimes described as islands under the sea.
The team includes researchers from Universidad National Autonoma de Mexico, the Universidad Autonoma de Baja California Sur, the Centro Interdisciplinario de Ciencias Marinas in La Paz, and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego.
Joining the expedition are marine biologists, ecologists, oceanographers, and taxonomists specializing in a range of underwater species.
“Nobody has seen what we're going to see in this expedition,†said Vivianne Solis-Weiss, a seaworm expert from the Universidad National Autonoma de Mexico.
Ezcurra is calling it a “bioblitz,†or rapid assessment of the region's biodiversity.
The areas to be surveyed are, at their deepest points, shallow enough to receive significant amounts of nutrients from the surface but too deep for much light to pierce through.
“That's the area that's completely unexplored,†said Ezcurra, former director of Mexico's National Institute of Ecology. With marine scientists focused on the deeper and more shallow parts of the sea, this zone had been overlooked, he said.
Dubbed the world's aquarium, the Gulf of California separates the Baja California peninsula from Mexico's mainland. With 39 percent of the world's species of sea mammals and a third of its cetacean species, its environmental importance overshadows its relatively small size.
In 2005, the United Nations declared 244 uninhabited islands in the gulf and their surrounding waters a World Heritage Site. The Mexican government has designated several of the gulf's seamounts as conservation priority areas, even though little is known about them.
“This would add knowledge and elements for the conservation of the richest parts of the sea,†Ezcurra said.
Sub to explore undersea islands
By Sandra Dibble
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
August 23, 2008
Dark underwater mountains rise off the coast of Baja California Sur, too deep for scuba divers and virtually unexplored. This week, scientists began diving hundreds of feet beneath the surface of the Gulf of California, searching for new species and insights that could help protect the region's commercial fisheries.
“We know less about this area than we know about the surface of Mars,†said Exequiel Ezcurra, the leader of the expedition that began yesterday and ends Sept. 5. Ezcurra is provost and director of the Biodiversity Research Center of the Californias at the San Diego Natural History Museum.
From whale sharks to giant manta rays to bottlenose dolphin, scientists have long documented the variety of life that thrives in Mexico's Gulf of California. But little is known about areas farther below on seamounts and deep-sea reefs.
The dozen scientists participating in the project are taking turns inside a tiny yellow submarine with a robotic arm and 360-degree view, collecting samples and taking photographs and videos to document the world sometimes described as islands under the sea.
The team includes researchers from Universidad National Autonoma de Mexico, the Universidad Autonoma de Baja California Sur, the Centro Interdisciplinario de Ciencias Marinas in La Paz, and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego.
Joining the expedition are marine biologists, ecologists, oceanographers, and taxonomists specializing in a range of underwater species.
“Nobody has seen what we're going to see in this expedition,†said Vivianne Solis-Weiss, a seaworm expert from the Universidad National Autonoma de Mexico.
Ezcurra is calling it a “bioblitz,†or rapid assessment of the region's biodiversity.
The areas to be surveyed are, at their deepest points, shallow enough to receive significant amounts of nutrients from the surface but too deep for much light to pierce through.
“That's the area that's completely unexplored,†said Ezcurra, former director of Mexico's National Institute of Ecology. With marine scientists focused on the deeper and more shallow parts of the sea, this zone had been overlooked, he said.
Dubbed the world's aquarium, the Gulf of California separates the Baja California peninsula from Mexico's mainland. With 39 percent of the world's species of sea mammals and a third of its cetacean species, its environmental importance overshadows its relatively small size.
In 2005, the United Nations declared 244 uninhabited islands in the gulf and their surrounding waters a World Heritage Site. The Mexican government has designated several of the gulf's seamounts as conservation priority areas, even though little is known about them.
“This would add knowledge and elements for the conservation of the richest parts of the sea,†Ezcurra said.