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Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History
Brownish grey rocks and sand on the dark seafloor are illuminated by a flood light, showing patches of yellow, orange and pink sponges. Purple, white, and yellow soft corals are attached to the rocks, and long feathery arms of crinoids poke out of crevices.

MDBC News & Highlights

Updates

April 1, 2024. Congratulations to Claudia Vaga and Andrea Quattrini for their new paper out in Zoologica Scripta. Their work increases our knowledge of deep sea scleractinian cup corals, some of which can be found in deep Gulf of Mexico habitats and are of interest to MDBC restoration activities.

  • Vaga et al. 2024. Untangling deep-sea corals systematics: Description of a new family, Stephanocyathidae (Anthozoa, Scleractinia), through a genomic approach. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/zsc.12657

February 14, 2024. Our NMNH-MDBC Education and Outreach team participated in a Valentines Day educational program that highlighted different symbiotic relationships in MDBCs. The program was featured in Smithsonian Magazine.

February 1, 2024. Claudia Vaga, Andrea Quattrini, and MDBC collaborator Cheryl Morrison (USGS) are co-authors on a new paper out in Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution describing the population structure, genetic diversity, and phylogenetics of the scleractinian coral genus Madrepora. Species of Madrepora occur in the deep Gulf of Mexico and this taxon is of interest to MDBC projects.

  • Capel et al. 2024. How long have we been mistaken? Multi-tools shedding light into the systematics of the widespread deep-water genus Madrepora Linnaeus, 1758 (Scleractinia). DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ympev.2023.107994 

December 2023. Our NMNH-MDBC educator Jamie Thompson has published an article overviewing the MDBC portfolio on the NMNH Ocean Hall Portal site: Deep Gulf Restoration After a Monumental Oil Spill

July 31, 2023. Learn about MDBC expeditions in the Gulf of Mexico via an interactive ArcGIS StoryMap: StoryMap: Mesophotic and Deep Benthic Communities Expeditions

February 22, 2023. See some statistics summarizing the 2022 MDBC cruise season: Deepwater Horizon 2022 Gulf of Mexico Deep Sea Cruise Season, By the Numbers 

Partners

To learn more about the MDBC portfolio projects from our NOAA partners, please visit:

NOAA Fisheries: Mesophotic and Deep Benthic Communities Restoration

NOAA National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science: Gulf of Mexico Mesophotic and Deep Benthic Communities Restoration