charismaticmicrofauna

72 hours from now I will be on a plane on my way to Manzanilla, Mexico. All of our laboratory equipment has been shipped to San Francisco over the last few months to be put onto the RV Atlantis which should be on its way to Mexico to meet us on Thursday.

I’ve spent the last three months running and rerunning my experiments in order to optimize my experimental methods and become more proficient at my techniques. One of my experiments involves 3 different syringes in a 1 mililter reaction tube that is pressurized with argon gas to keep it anaerobic. Oh, and I’m also working with radioactive carbon that I absolutely can not spill or else other scientists who use the radioactivity van for very sensitive radioactive dating will get bad data, and it would be my fault. Don’t spill radioactivity on a ship in the East Pacific during an El Nino hurricane season. Got it! What could go wrong?!

What is a van, on a research vessel? Good question. The Atlantis, like the Knorr which I sailed on  during my last research cruise, can be modified depending on the type of research that is being conducted. Many types of researchers use research vessels (RVs) from ecologists, to geochemists, to paleogoelogists (who are the ones that I need to be mindful of in particular), and many, many more. A van is essentially a cargo container that has been modified to house essential equipment according to the needs of the scientists.

My next post will be from Mexico. In the meantime, I need to practice “Hola, soy biologa. Tiene pollo o higado de res fresco? Que tan fresco es? Lo han congelado? No puedo usar higado congelado.” Which means, “Hello, I am a biologist. Do you have fresh chicken or beef liver? How fresh is it? Has it been frozen? I can not use frozen liver.”

Yes, I need livers because we need a standard to use for one of my experiments that a liver can reliably provide.

Hopefully, this will be my view from 2 miles below the Pacific Ocean at a mesothermic vent at some point over the next month:

Source: ocean.nationalgeographic.com