TEXT: LENA BARNER-RASMUSSEN PHOTO: MISSION31. Under pressure [ PASSION ]

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1 TEXT: LENA BARNER-RASMUSSEN PHOTO: MISSION31 [ PASSION ] Under pressure Ocean engineer Grace Young doesn t mind being under pressure. She s stayed under water for more than two weeks as one of the crew members in the Mission31 expedition. And she didn t even feel like surfacing when her time was up. 46 Twentyfour

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3 A MERE 5% OF THE OCEANS HAVE BEEN EXPLORED. In 1964, marine explorer Jacques Cousteau spent 30 days in a submarine in the Red Sea together with six marine biologist colleagues. This summer, the family record was broken by another Cousteau, the famous explorer s grandson, Fabien Cousteau. He spent 31 days in the world s only underwater marine laboratory, the Aquarius, situated about nine nautical miles off Florida Key West at a depth of 18 metres. (Hence the expedition name Mission31.) There are six bunks in the laboratory, and for two weeks, one of those bunks was occupied by Grace Young, an MIT ocean engineer. An avid diver and ocean engineer, Young was tasked with getting footage of underwater creature behaviour that happens too fast for the human eye to register. Using an Edgertronic high speed-camera, named after Harold Eugene Doc Edgerton, who attended Young s alma mater MIT decades ago and pioneered high-speed photography, the Aquarius team was able to solve riddles impossible to do from brief surface dives. One of these riddles is how the goliath grouper, a large saltwater fish, hunts its prey. Their unique predatory behaviour has puzzled marine biologists for years. We hoped to validate an unproven theory that goliath groupers use the sound of a collapsing cavitation bubble formed in their head as a weapon to stun their prey before moving in to swallow them. This dynamics of fear was actually one of the research topics during the expedition. Young, the first one to ever use the camera under water, says that marine life is a very complex ecosystem that finely balances between predator and prey. Using the Edgertronic, we were able to see and evaluate the behaviour of prey in the immediate vicinity of a predator in the nanoseconds before capture or escape. The changes in the prey s behaviour are very evident. KNOWLEDGE LEADS TO INVOLVEMENT This point of the research may sound odd and unrelated to the environmental mission. But Young says that it s interesting, and the more we know about other species, the more we get concerned about their survival and the mutual role of man in the global ecosystem, hopefully leading to a more universal sensitivity towards our fellow creatures on Earth. And we know very little about what is happening below the surface a mere 5% of the oceans have been explored. What we don t know runs the risk of becoming irrelevant. But we should and must care about the ocean, not only because it houses some of our most fascinating creatures, but also because it is our life support system. Without the ocean, Earth is just another rock in space, says Young. Plankton in the ocean produces at least half the oxygen we breathe, seafood provides essential protein for nearly one-third of the world s population, and the ocean plays a critical role in absorbing and storing carbon emissions for regulating our climate. The Mission31 enabled some giant leaps in getting to know our underwater world. As the crew members in the Aquarius were fully saturated, i.e., accustomed to the underwater pressure, they could dive for as many hours as they wanted without danger of catching diver s disease. And that s what they did, up to 12 hours a day. The research we achieved during these weeks would have taken years if we had only been surface diving. PLASTIC INSIDE DOLPHINS During those four weeks, the Aquarius expedition gathered interesting research beyond the goliath grouper. One of the projects was to determine how corals respond internally to daily fluctuations in external temperature, light, ph and dissolved oxygen. This is the first long-term data set from wild corals. The expedition also collected data on how zooplankton communities change with climate change. Zooplankton is amazing! They are the very first link in the marine animal food chain, so it s no understatement to say that marine life as we know it totally depends on it. Environmental contamination Young says the ocean has become a global garbage can was also investigated during the expedition. It s heartbreaking to see the effect of human waste on marine life, like dolphins and whales washing up on shore with their stomachs bloated with plastics. The expedition deployed and recovered sensors daily that absorb and measure environmental contaminants, including PCBs, PAHs and possibly dispersants from oil spills. PCBs (polychlorinatedbiphenyl) is a group of oily liquids used mainly as transformer oil. They are very stable compounds and do not decompose easily. The same goes for PAHs (polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons) that are used in plastics. 48 Twentyfour

4 The goliath grouper has a unique way of getting dinner on the table. Grace Young got to get up close with one during one of her dives. Being fully saturated, the crew could dive for as long as they wished. Fabien Cousteau, inside the Aquarius, led the expedition. Twentyfour

5 Young was in charge of using the Edgertronic high-speed camera. The camera was used under water for the first time to solve riddles impossible to do from brief surface dives. MESMERISED BY CHOCOLATE MACHINES Grace Young grew up in Ohio, where her family had a chocolate factory. She was mesmerised by the machines in the factory. In school, Young was the first girl to join a new robotics team and that s where she finally became hooked on designing and building her own robots. At MIT she got the chance to combine her passions for robotics and the sea as she became involved in marine robotics design. Last fall, she hopped on a flight to the UK, where she will spend the next years doing a PhD at Oxford University, studying the environmental impact of deep sea mining on the ocean ecosystems. I m immensely curious about what lies beneath the waves and have a bit of an adventurous spirit. I can t imagine any more rewarding work than developing technologies that help us explore deeper and further beneath the waves. Staying at 18 metres (60 feet), where the Aquarius lies, took the effort of cutting-edge technology and daily surface support to make it happen. 50 Twentyfour

6 THE SHIPPING INDUSTRY CAN DRAMATICALLY REDUCE THE MARINE POLLUTION THAT SHIPS PRODUCE. The Aquarius had wireless Internet and all other basic necessities. Young sipping coffee with Fabien Cousteau. had during the expedition (Fabien Cousteau brought a deck of cards to the Aquarius but it was never opened once during the 31 days) was sitting at the little dining room table and gazing out of the window where all sorts of sea creatures were drawn by the lights from the laboratory. These creatures would come right up and practically nuzzle the window. I d sit there, typically late at night when everyone else was sleeping and the Aquarius was quiet. Imagine exploring at 100 feet, or even 10,000 feet. We have so much farther to go, literally and figuratively, to truly understand our oceans. So the Aquarius was just a start. Young loved staying at the Aquarius, although things got a bit tight. The laboratory measures 13 by 6 by 5 metres. But with hot water, a mini-kitchen, climate control and wireless Internet available, it had all the basic necessities. Young s favourite way of spending the little spare time she DIFFICULT LEAVING THE SEA The most difficult part of the expedition was surfacing, having been surrounded by beautiful sea life for two weeks. As much as I missed friends and family, I really wanted to stay down under. I could definitely see myself having an underwater vacation home! Having stayed two weeks under water, she says her perspective has changed. When you see firsthand the wholesale destruction caused by human activity, it seriously makes me wonder if we really are Earth s alpha species. More knowledge is the key to a changed behaviour. Without knowledge, we can t fully understand the ocean s ecosystem and how to remediate the damage already done. Still, Young points out, we know more about the far side of the moon than we know about our oceans. This despite the fact that ocean exploration costs a mere fraction of what space exploration does. The more you know, the more interested and involved you ll become. And the more interested you become, the more you ll care. And the more you care, the more others will care. Ultimately, governments and industries make better, more informed ocean management policies on a global scale. Unquestionably, the shipping industry can dramatically reduce the marine pollution that ships produce, she says. Twentyfour