CoML and Ocean Layer in Google Earth Bring Ocean Information to Life
Ocean in Google Earth, which enables user to dive beneath the surface of the sea and explore the world’s oceans, was launched on February 2, 2009 at the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco, CA.
“There’s no better dive than what’s riding along with Census of Marine Life researchers,” says Patrick Halpin, a Census of Marine Life scientist and director of the Marine Geospatial Ecology Lab, Nicholas School of the Environment at Duke University in Durham, NC. “In eight years of expeditions to remote and unexplored places in the ocean, Census of Marine Life scientists have found new life on nearly every expedition”.
In the CoML layer of this new feature of Google Earth, we provide rare glimpses of interesting new life forms from some of the most remote places on the planet, with stories of the courageous, inquisitive, and adventurous scientists who set out to find what lives below the surface.”
Users can follow along on scientific explorations to the coldest, saltiest water on the planet or to a new ocean environment created by an ice shelf break the size of Jamaica or to the hottest hydrothermal vent ever discovered—hot enough to melt lead! These journeys are but a few of the 129 possibilities for learning more about marine life available on the new Census of Marine Life layer in Ocean in Google Earth.
