Imagine Magazine - Johns Hopkins - January/February 2015 - (Page 6)

The Glow of Discovery Edith Widder, Ph.D. President and Senior Scientist Ocean Research & Conservation Association (ORCA) Edith Widder has spent a lot of her career underwater-deep underwater. In diving suits and submersibles, she has collected, measured, and studied bioluminescent creatures of the deep ocean. Working with engineers, Widder has also developed innovate instruments that allow scientists to see the deep ocean in new ways. Her camera systems Eye-in-the-Sea and Medusa have captured video not only of new species, but also of the giant squid in its natural habitat. In 2006, Widder was named a MacArthur Fellow for her work with ORCA, an organization dedicated to conserving the oceans-the setting of what she calls an "absolutely amazing, dream career." Action potential In my high school yearbook, I said I wanted to be a marine biologist. But when I got to college, I started to realize that not many people get to become sea-going marine biologists; there just wasn't a lot of funding for that kind of work. At that point I was getting really interested in neurobiology, and as it turned out, a lot of my undergraduate neurophysiology work was on marine organisms. I did my Ph.D. in neurobiology in James Case's lab at UC Santa Barbara. When I started, Jim and Beatrice Sweeney, a major authority on bioluminescence, were planning an experiment in which an electrode would be inserted into a bioluminescent dinoflagellate to record the action potential that triggers the flash of light. Bioluminescence was a cool topic, and to be working at the edge of human knowledge about it was thrilling to me. Drawn to the light With a grant from the Navy, Jim acquired the latest and greatest spectrometer that could measure really, really low light levels. It was key for being able to measure the emission spectra of bioluminescent organisms. It was a complicated piece of gear, but I've always been a gadget freak, and over time I became the lab expert on it. At that point, Jim decided that we needed to start measuring all these animals in the ocean that make light. Suddenly, I was a sea-going marine biologist. The first time I went to sea, the researchers were doing trawls with special nets that could bring animals up alive, 6 imagine and they were bringing up unbelievable creatures. I couldn't believe these things even existed-I'd never even seen a picture of anything like this anglerfish, this dragonfish-and they had light organs all over them. I was beside myself. On another cruise, they were testing a diving suit called the WASP as a tool for ocean exploration. I was out there to measure any of the animals they were able to collect, but I'd talk on the headset to whoever was down in the suit. I'd ask them to turn out the lights and tell me what they saw, because I knew they'd see bioluminescence. They would say, "Oh, wow, that is so cool!" It was driving me nuts. I trained as a pilot over the next year so I could go down and see for myself. An explosion of curiosity My first dive was an evening dive in the Santa Barbara Channel. I went down to 880 feet, and I turned out the lights. I was blown away, just absolutely blown away. There is no statistic that can prepare you for seeing that kind of a living light show. I knew that this was what I wanted to see for the rest of my life. I was suddenly filled with questions. Why were all these animals making light? A single photon of blue light is energetically equivalent to the hydrolysis of six ATP molecules, and one of these flashes of light can produce 1011 photons. It's a staggering amount of energy for an animal to use, so what were the driving forces? I wanted to know the evolutionary pressures that led to this. I wanted to know how it all worked. I wanted to know which animals were communicating with which animals and what they were saying. Mission: Imperceptible When I was diving in the WASP, I wanted to talk to the animals. I created a blue LED light stick that I could flick on and off, thinking that the animals would respond. They didn't. It was very frustrating for me, but then I realized that I wasn't exactly unobtrusive, bouncing up and down in a big bulbous yellow suit. I knew we'd been scaring a lot of animals away with motion and noise. So we set out to develop a camera system that could sit inconspicuously on the ocean floor and record animals without disturbing them. After a lot of development and testing, we finally had a system that we took on an expedition to the Gulf of Mexico. We put the camera down next to a brine pool-an amazing underwater oasis Jan/Feb 2015 OCEAN RESEARCH CONSERVATION ASSOCIATION in my own words

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Imagine Magazine - Johns Hopkins - January/February 2015

Big Picture
In My Own Words
Land & Sea
Going Full Circle with Ocean Conservation
At Home in the Water
Diving into Marine Science
Ocean Views
Becoming a Steward of the Seas
Engineering for Ocean Health
Selected Opportunities and Resources
The Wonderful World of MOOCs
Super
Off the Shelf
Word Wise
Exploring Career Options
One Step Ahead
Planning Ahead for College
Students Review: UC San Diego
Creative Minds Imagine
Mark Your Calendar
Knossos Games

Imagine Magazine - Johns Hopkins - January/February 2015

https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20160506_LTB
https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20160304_CTW
https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20160102_JHB
https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20151112_DSS
https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20150910_RUR
https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20150506_WSH
https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20150304_TGB
https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20150102_IDS
https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20141112_ASE
https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20140910_PBD
https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20140506_BDA
https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20140304_SHD
https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20140102_JUS
https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20131112_MX5
https://www.nxtbook.com/mercury/imagine/20120910_CTD
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20130910_AFN
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20130506_PLQ
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20130304_TRB
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20130102_GME
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20121112_LRH
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20120910_YBS
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20120506_B2H
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20120304_P3A
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20120102_FMS
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20111112_TAML
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20110910_ATSP
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20110506_DMI
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20110304_MIV
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20110102_JFH
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20101112IMJHND
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20100910QTVS1
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20100506_INH
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20100304_SFF
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/imagine/20090102_v2
https://www.nxtbookmedia.com