Phytoplankton

Skeleton of Asteromphalus heptactis

Skeleton of Asteromphalus heptactis

Rhizosolenia styliformis

Rhizosolenia styliformis

I ended up changing my cruise project from lava morphology/bathymetry mapping to looking at relative abundance of phytoplankton above Axial Seamount. Last year on this cruise I did a project related to geological & biological mapping of mosaicked images of the seafloor at Hydrate Ridge, so I’m glad I chose to do something else to broaden my knowledge base. Before this I have had very little experience doing cell counts of plankton, or any serious identification. I’ve been getting a lot of help, but I’ve loved it! In particular, I really enjoyed taking pictures of them. It’s a tricky process though; it’s surprisingly difficult to focus on the entire organism. These pictures are few of the ones I’ll be using in my final project presentation tomorrow.