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Hybrid Underwater Robot Investigates Ocean's 'Twilight Zone'

Two hundred meters under the waves of the ocean lies the mesopelagic zone, a cold, dark region where humans rarely venture. This area, called the “twilight zone,” features animals like krill, squid, and jellyfish. Mesobot is an autonomous underwater robot developed by researchers from Stanford University, the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, and the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, who published their research in Science Robotics  . It weighs about 550 pounds and can track a single organism for over a day without human intervention, relying on a long-lasting battery and advanced tracking algorithms to follow creatures around. With an array of sensors and a high-definition camera, Mesobot could help scientists learn about this mysterious ocean area and its impact on the Earth's climate.

Topics:
Motion Control Robotics

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    Transcript

    00:00:00 this slow-moving jellyfish is surprisingly hard to track its home the ocean twilight zone lets in very little light but houses plenty of organisms the creatures who live here are constantly on the move drifting up and down to hunt and avoid predators but it's tough for scientists to observe these stealthy ocean dwellers without

    00:00:20 disturbing their migration patterns most underwater vehicles emit light and sound which can cause camera shy animals to flee and their equipment can only operate for a few hours without human input not nearly long enough to observe the slow daily migrations that can take over 24 hours to unfold new research presents an underwater

    00:00:41 robot that has captured these elusive movements and its creators think it's a big step toward illuminating life within this murky ecosystem mesobot can follow marine animals for over a day without disturbing their environment its array of sensors and advanced tracking system lock

    00:00:57 onto targets following single organisms without a human taking the helm it's not just a fancy camera taking nice pictures of sea creatures mesobot could provide key insights into the earth's climate the migrations of animals in the ocean twilight zone have a major impact on the carbon cycle as co2 in the atmosphere dissolves in

    00:01:19 the ocean surface-dwelling plankton transform it into organic carbon these plankton are a perfect snack for travelers from the ocean twilight zone when they return to their home in deeper water they release waste trapping the carbon deep in the ocean this carbon elevator takes up to 6 billion tons of carbon out of the

    00:01:37 atmosphere every year by tracking the movements of twilight zone dwellers mesobot could study these important patterns helping unveil these dark areas of the ocean you