Status of activities and outcomes in the MEESO project's work package 2 from 1 September 2019 to 28 February 2021.
Summary
In work package 2, Survey and sampling technology development, the partners have focused on development, implementation and field testing of new technology and methodology for accurate quantification of mesopelagic macroplankton and micronekton resources. Experiences from this work, as well as the collected field data, will form an important basis for the future works toward defining a protocol for monitoring of mesopelagic resources.
Highlights from the field data so far include new information on acoustic properties of mesopelagic scatterers, as well as novel data on organismal densities inside and outside of the deep scattering layers.
Highlights
- High resolution acoustic data sampled at mesopelagic depths provide insight into densities and acoustic properties of mesopelagic micronekton.
- Direct acoustic estimation of mesopelagic biomass has been demonstrated using a novel combination of broadband acoustic data and a theoretical scattering model.
- Non-graded trawl designs developed allow more accurate survey sampling of mesopelagic micronekton.
- Improved trawl instrumentation allows a better understanding of results from trawl sampling.