Wonders of the oceans
L-R: Graphic on the findings from the first-ever global marine life census, a ten year collaboration involving 2,700 scientists from 670 institutions. This undated photo released by Census of Marine Life and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution shows a transparent sea cucumber, Enypniastes
Earlier this month, a team of international scientists wrapped up their decade-long study of the first ever global census of the sea-life. A massive project, the details of which have been published in the open access journal PLoS ONE, which documented a world within the world that turned out to be livelier and more jubilantly vibrant than ever imagined! A $650 million international research project that involved more than 2,700 researchers from 670 institutions from across 80 nations spent around 9,000 days at sea. That required at least 540 expeditions to create a register of species in 25 biologically representative regions that ranges from the Antarctic through the temperate and tropical seas to the chilly oceans of the Arctic. Described as the most comprehensive study of this kind, nearly 30 million observations of thousands of species were made according to Ocean Biogeographic Information System (OBIS), the global marine life database of the census. This massive collection of millions of species prompted researchers to identify more than 6,000 potentially new species, of which 1,200 have been formally described and around 5000 more species that have been collected are yet to be named or studied. And this also led the scientists to increase the estimate of known marine species from about 230,000 to almost 250,000. And this 250,000 species of marine plant and animals are just out of 1 million (some experts say, it could even reach much higher) that is thought to have existed out there in our oceans. Indeed, vast arrays of sea-creatures have been discovered and many of them are quite extra-ordinary in nature. Like the "Jurassic shrimp" which was thought to be extinct for more than 50 million years. Some of the new species include, Dinochelus ausubeli, the blind lobster with a long, spiny, pincer, which was found 330 yards below the surface of Philippine Sea; sea spiders, a family of eight-legged creatures which rarely grow bigger than a fingernail in UK waters, have been discovered up to nine inches (23cm) across in Antarctic seas; the "Squid-worm", a new species of worm, was found living in the deep water of the Celebes Sea in south east Asia; a furry crab, named the Yeti Crab or Kiwa hirsuta, which was found beside a vent in the deep sea off Easter Island in the south Pacific. And not only this last one was entirely a new species but also part of a new family previously unknown to science. Scientists also used sound, satellites and electronics to track the migratory routes of many species including large squids; the Pacific and Atlantic blue-fin tuna; humpback whales; puffins that covered the "longest-ever electronically recorded migration" (a nearly 40,000-mile circle every year from New Zealand to Japan, Russia, Alaska, Chile and back); planktons and even seals. The census has also found another more basic connection in the genetic blueprint of life in the marine ecosystem. And that is just as chimps and humans share more than 95 percent of their DNA, the species of the oceans have most of their DNA in common, too. Another interesting discovery was the huge communities of different species of marine life-forms that was found to be scattered across the deep ocean floor, all living at the mouth of thermal vents and rifts that seep nutrients into the ocean. And previously, it was thought that deep sea floors are almost lifeless due to the huge pressure, pitch black conditions and cold water that are found at the oceanic depths of greater than 6,000 feet (1.8 km). In the years to come, scientists believe more knowledge of the marine species will be learnt, mostly from the tropics, deep-seas and southern hemisphere. Despite this "decade of discovery", scientists are still astonished by the extent of marine life-forms that are yet to be introduced in the realm of modern science. But at the same time, they are equally worried with the growing threats to the marine habitat which includes, over-fishing, loss of habitat, pollution, invasive species, rising water temperature and acidification, oil spill and low oxygen content of the seawater. Given the tragic state of global climate and the constant deterioration of the environment, the growing threat to the oceanic habitat surely is a concern for every land-dwelling earthling.
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