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University Museum of Bergen

Humans leave traces – also on the greatest ocean depths

A Japanese toothpaste tube, a beer can, and clinker from the first Atlantic steamers. At present, researchers find objects like these on the greatest ocean depths. They are now on display in a new section of the exhibition - in time capsules.

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The artist Gøril Walllin has cast the deep sea waste in epoxy; in forms she calls time capsules. This has been included as part of a new section in the deep sea exhibition Deeper than Light now being shown in the Atlantic Ocean Park Aquarium in Ålesund, Norway.

The new section of the exhibition presents glimpses of the results of close to 8 years of contribution from five different international deep sea projects, including the MAR-ECO project. Images of new, unknown organisms, new results and knowledge, and factual traces of human impact in the deep sea, are some of the things the newly added material shows. The new section which has been designed by exhibition designer Anne Aspen will be part of the exhibition when it opens at the Smithsonian Natural History Museum in Washington in February next year.

Read review of the exhibition opening in Ålesund

Events for the general public
The international MAR- ECO project, headed by the Norwegian Institute of Marine Research and Bergen Museum/ the University of Bergen is now in the result phase. This does not only comprise scientific summaries and publications, but also public outreach measures. A new, popular scientific book, Life in the Mid-Atlantic, which describes the project and the exciting life along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, will be in print in the middle of October. 
By then, all the researchers in the project will gather in a concluding workshop in Kristiansand, where a large event aimed at the general public also will take place on Wednesday 21 October.