March 13, 2017 — A group of scientists is taking a deep dive into the salty waters and the food web south of Martha’s Vineyard.
Heidi Sosik, a senior scientist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, will use submersible robotic microscopes she helped design and build, as well as an array of other sophisticated scientific gadgets to gain a fuller understanding of the ecosystem on part of the continental shelf stretching from just south of the Vineyard to an area where coastal waters meet the open ocean.
The study, which will involve a group of scientists and researchers led by Sosik, is being funded with $6 million from the National Science Foundation.
“The goal is that these ecosystems will be studied indefinitely,” Sosik said.
The team of experts will scrutinize the very foundation of the marine food chain: tiny plankton invisible to the eye but which can be seen with the aid of powerful underwater microscopes. The goal is to determine patterns in the ocean’s food web and how and why they change over time, so better management practices can be developed.
Waters off the Northeast coast are rich in fish, which depend on plankton to survive and in turn support the vigorous regional fishing industry that’s existed there for centuries.