Golden Orb: Deep-Sea Mystery Unraveled

0:00Scientists with a national oceanic and atmospheric administration spotted a weird golden orb more than two miles deep in the Gulf of Alaska, West of, Prince of Wales Island, at first they thought it was an egg case, or a dead sponge stuck to a rock. Turns out, after three years of digging, it's the dead base cells from a massive sea anemone. This fine came from the SeaScape Alaska program, kicking off in 2021 to map the ocean floor. NOAA says 61% of U.S. waters off Alaska are still unmapped, and that's a big deal for stuff like territorial claims. The program's data even helped the State Department stake out extended continental shelf areas in the high Arctic and bearing sea back in 2000, 23. Experts were stumped at first, pulling in zoologes from NOAA fisheries and the Smithsonian. They use everything for morphology, to DNA sequencing, and deep sea know how to crack it. One lead scientist called it a complex puzzle, needing a team effort, way beyond routine lab work.

1:02Meanwhile, the orb wasn't the only surprise. Last year, aboard the Coast Guard Cutter Healy, they found a gas-bueing volcano-like mound rising 500 meters from the Arctic sea floor. Part of the same mapping push. As SeaScape Alaska rolls on from the NOAA ship, Okianos explore. Expect more deep sea riddles to unravel, boosting our grasp of ocean resources for, security, economy, and the planet's health. From your city, powered by AI, this is Anchorage News Today.