How do fish survive in the deep ocean?

CrowdScience

BBC

Science, Technology

4.8 • 985 Ratings

🗓️ 9 August 2024

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

When listener Watum heard about the Titan submersible implosion in the news in 2023, a question popped up in his mind: if a machine that we specifically built for this purpose cannot sustain the water pressure of the deep ocean, how do fish survive down there?

In this episode, we travel with marine biologist Alan Jamieson to the second deepest place in our oceans: the Tonga trench. Meanwhile, presenter Caroline Steel speaks to Edie Widder about the creatures that illuminate our oceans, and travels to Copenhagen to take a closer look one of the strangest deep sea creatures and its deep sea adaptations.

But even fish have their limits! Scientist Paul Yancey correctly predicted the deepest point that fish can live, and it all comes down to one particular molecule.

So is there anything living beyond these depths? Well, there is only one way to find out…

Contributors: Prof Alan Jamieson, University of Western Australia Luke Siebermaier, submersible pilot Dr Edie Widder, Ocean Research & Conservation Association Peter Rask Møller, Natural History Museum of Denmark Prof Paul Yancey, Whitman College

Presenter: Caroline Steel Producer: Florian Bohr Editor: Martin Smith Production Co-ordinator: Ishmael Soriano Studio Manager: Steve Greenwood

(Image: Deep-sea fish - stock photo, Credit: superjoseph via Getty Images)

Transcript

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0:00.0	I'm Rory Stewart and I want to talk about ignorance. I will die without having read
0:08.2	everything that was written in classical Latin. Because ignorance isn't simply the opposite of knowledge.
0:14.7	It's part of what it means to be human.
0:17.5	Just about every game I can think of involves ignorance.
0:22.1	There's no adventure without ignorance. There's no there's no narrative.
0:25.0	The long history of ignorance from Confucius to Kianan
0:29.0	with me Rory Stewart,
0:31.0	listen on BBC Sounds.
0:33.0	Thank you, Baku, Eso.
0:35.0	You are ready for the water.
0:37.0	Stand by to the thrust starboard.
0:39.0	Break, break, bridge, ESO.
0:41.0	Hello and welcome to Crowd Science from the BBC World Service. I'm Caroline Steele and we're starting this episode in the South Pacific, close to the island nation of Tonga.
0:53.0	So the current time is exactly 8 o'clock in the morning, local time,
0:57.0	and we'll wait for permission to dive.
0:59.0	This is marine biologist Professor Alan Jameson. He sat on the surface of the ocean, in a
1:05.8	submersible weighing more than 12 tons. It's called Bakunawa, or Baku for short.
1:13.0	Two.
1:14.0	All land secure, handrails are clear, swimming and clear,
1:16.0	you have permission to dive.
1:18.0	And Alan isn't alone.
1:20.0	He's with pilot Luke Zebamire.
	...

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