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How far do deep-sea species range, and how many remain undiscovered?

Those questions are driving a $2 million collaborative research project co-led by ��˾�������� biologist Dr. Craig McClain. Funded by the National Science Foundation, the multi-year study will investigate the biodiversity of one of Earth’s least explored ecosystems and could reshape scientists’ understanding of life in the deep ocean.

“The deep sea isn’t empty — it’s just unread. We’re using DNA to read it at a resolution nobody has attempted before, thousands of sediment samples across an area most people will never think about, to figure out who actually lives down there and how much of it we stand to lose before we’ve even found it.”

McClain, a professor in the in the , is leading UL ��˾��������’s role in the project alongside co-principal investigators Dr. Holly Bik and Dr. Yun Tao of the University of Georgia. UL ��˾��������’s share of the nearly $2 million award is about $900,000; collaborators received the remainder.  

Together, the researchers will study the abyssal plain — the vast, flat seafloor that lies nearly 2.5 miles beneath the ocean’s surface — in the eastern Pacific Ocean, combining environmental DNA sequencing, traditional taxonomy and molecular phylogenetics to map the distribution of small-bodied marine life across local, regional and ocean-basin scales.

The project confronts a long-standing question in deep-sea biology. “Somewhere on the seafloor right now may be entire species we’ve already declared ‘common,’ when in reality each population is alone, isolated and irreplaceable. This project sets out to answer one of the most consequential unresolved questions in ocean science: have we been fundamentally misreading the biodiversity of our own planet?”

To answer, the team will analyze seafloor sediment samples to identify species, examine their genetic relationships and reconstruct their evolutionary history.

The findings could improve scientists’ understanding of biodiversity in the deep ocean while helping guide conservation efforts as human activities such as deep-sea mining expand into previously undisturbed habitats. Researchers will use the data to develop new ecological models that estimate extinction risk for deep-sea species.

Beyond expanding what science knows about life in the deep sea, the project will put undergraduates on the front lines of that discovery, giving them a rare chance to join offshore expeditions and do hands-on deep-sea research most scientists don’t experience until much later in their careers.

Photo caption: Dr. Craig McClain, a professor in the School of Biological Sciences at UL ��˾��������.