According to a scientific journal Communication Earth and Environment, Nautical charts in most areas show only approximate depths and often miss entire seamounts or canyons. Scientists decided to use seals to explore the depths.
A team of researchers installed GPS tracking devices on elephant seals and Weddell seals. For years, scientists have been collecting data on ocean temperature and salinity by placing trackers on these marine mammals living off Antarctica.
For the new study, scientists compared location and depth data from these dives with less detailed maps of the seafloor. They found places where seals dived deeper than suggested maps, meaning current depth estimates are inaccurate.
In Vincennes Bay in eastern Antarctica, seals helped scientists find a large hidden underwater canyon that goes more than 1.5 km deep. An Australian research vessel called RSV Nuyina then measured the exact depth of the canyon using sonar, and the researchers proposed naming their discovery Mirunga-Nuyina Canyon, after the ship and the Mirounga elephant seals involved in the expedition.
“The seals discovered the canyon and the ship confirmed it,” said Clive McMahon, an Integrated Marine Observing System researcher in Australia and co-author of the new study published in the journal Communications Earth & Environment.
But seals cannot map the entire ocean floor. The trackers used in the study were only able to determine the seal’s geographic location within 3 km, providing useful data but not exactly high accuracy. Also, because seals do not always dive to the ocean floor, they can only show where the bottom is deeper than existing maps, but not the maximum depth.
McMahon notes that scientists can improve this data by using more accurate GPS trackers and analyzing the seals’ diving patterns to determine whether they reach the seafloor or simply remain in the water column and then return to the surface.
Thus, the study of the depths of the ocean with seals will continue.
seal before was attacked About people swimming in the sea in Azerbaijan.