Life on the Antarctic Seafloor

Tomorrow our team will start making the journey north, back to Chile, with a few stops along the way.  But since today is officially our last day of conducting science here in Antarctica, it seems fitting to share some images of the life we've seen on the deep seafloor.

Not only is imaging the seafloor one of the best ways for our team to study the populations of organisms living here, but it provides a glimpse into a part of the world that no one has ever seen before.

The deep sea is one of the least studied areas on the planet, with the Antarctic deep sea being researched even less due to it's harsh conditions and remoteness.

That means that beyond any conclusions we draw, or data we analyze, the simple act of imaging this unseen place is allowing for incredible discovery.

A deep sea jellyfish spotted in the open water column.

Bright orange brittle stars, relatives of sea stars, litter the Antarctic deep seafloor.

A sea whip, a type of soft coral, casting a long, thin shadow on the seafloor.

A skate laying still on the seafloor.

A toothfish laying on the rocky seafloor.

A white anemone next to a few brittle stars.

A bright red king crab on the move.

All of these images, and the tens of thousands more like them, were taken by SeaSled, a rugged underwater camera vehicle engineered and run by our team members from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.

With SeaSled currently more than a mile below the surface, being towed by our research vessel, and completing the last transect line of seafloor images, our team is so happy to have had such a successful Antarctic SeaScience Expedition!