OCEAN LECTURE SERIES

"Deep Scope: A Window into the Deep"
• Edie Widder, Ph.D.

About the 2005 Lecture

Share in the excitement of discovery as Dr. Edie Widder describes "Operation Deep Scope," last summer's highly exploratory expedition to the Gulf of Mexico. The Deep Scope expedition used new technological "eyes" to see into the depths and address questions about what animals may be escaping our nets, evading our bright and noisy submersibles, or simply escaping our notice.

See invisible animals made visible using polarized light and fluorescence and shy animals lured to pose for the Eye-in-the-Sea camera. Highlights include a giant 6-gill shark attacking the Eye-in-the-Sea, a swordfish attacking the Johnson-Sea-Link submersible, a fluorescent shark, and a 6-foot squid that's totally new to science. Exploration just doesn't get any better than this!

About the Speaker

Dr. Widder is a Senior Scientist in Harbor Branch's Division of Marine Science. She is also an Adjunct Research Professor in the Earth and Planetary Sciences Department of Johns Hopkins University, a Distinguished Scientist Adjunct at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, and an Adjunct Professor of Biological Science at Florida Institute of Technology and Florida Atlantic University. She serves on the editorial board of the Marine Technology Society and is a Councilor of the International Society of Bioluminescence and Chemiluminescence. She has participated in over 50 research expeditions, 30 as chief scientist and has made over 300 dives in the Johnson-Sea-Link submersibles. She is also a certified deep submersible pilot for the single-person submersibles, Wasp, Deep Rover, and Deep Worker.

Dr. Widder has been a pioneer in the field of marine bioluminescence. In 1985, working from the single-person submersible Deep Rover, she was the first person to make video recordings of bioluminescence in the ocean. She is a world authority on the quantification of marine bioluminescence and has developed an array of innovative tools for this purpose. She co-holds a patent on the High Intake Defined Excitation Bathyphotometer (HIDEX-BP), which is the standard in the U.S. Navy for measuring bioluminescence in the world's oceans. Her research in bioluminescence has been featured in numerous nature programs that have aired on the BBC, PBS, Discovery Channel, and National Geographic.

Besides being an author of over 60 peer-reviewed scientific publications, Dr. Widder has recently produced two children's book on bioluminescence (The Bioluminescence Coloring Book, now in its second printing and Lucinda's Lamps: A Mermaid's Guide to the Lights in the Sea, in press), and an award winning educational video (Secret Lights in the Sea). She is also widely recognized as a gifted speaker, who both educates and entertains her audience.