Farewell to AleutBio: Journey’s end and new beginnings

Prolog

Dear Readers,

Time is a peculiar thing—sometimes it crawls, and everything feels tedious; other times, it sprints, leaving you wondering where it all went. We’ve experienced every shade of this spectrum, and now, here we are at the end of the AleutBio project. This is our final blog entry, a bittersweet farewell.

Act 1: All Excited

We started our journey in July 2022 in remote Dutch Harbour with boundless excitement, setting off on the RV Sonne to explore the deep sea, a realm few have studied before. Everything was new—new colleagues, new and breathtaking seascapes, new species, and fresh insights. We spent seven weeks at sea, facing hardships like pandemic restrictions and grueling night shifts. Yet, we even achieved more than we had hoped, returning to Frankfurt with an incredible array of samples, ready to submerge into the diverse deep-sea life we had uncovered.

Act 2: Life of a Deep-Sea Explorer – Not So Glamorous, But Full of Hurdles

Being a deep-sea explorer sounds like a nonstop adventure, and occasionally it is. However, much of our work involved long hours in the lab or in front of the PC, facing tedious and repetitive tasks. Despite the monotony, the moments of discoveries under the microscope were awe-inspiring. We set out to investigate the distribution barriers of deep-sea species, but we encountered numerous hurdles ourselves. Lab work that didn’t go as planned set us back by months. At times, the lack of immediate results was demoralizing, making us feel like we were fighting an uphill battle. Yet, each small breakthrough provided the motivation to push forward, and the challenges only made our successes sweeter.

Act 3: “Endspurt”

The final stretch of the project felt like a months-long marathon sprint. We were racing against time to finalize our research, compile our findings, and weave them into a coherent story. Even as we write this blog, we are still in the process of tying everything together. But optimism prevails—our efforts are bearing fruit. We have illuminated how the Aleutian Trench connects to other ocean regions and uncovered its astonishing biodiversity. We’ve discovered numerous new isopod species, six of which will soon be named😊 These findings are just the tip of the iceberg, promising exciting directions for future research.

Epilog

And now, it’s time to leave the stage to the main protagonists of this play. Here are their final words – reflections from the heart of the AleutBio team:

Angelika: AleutBio was an extremely challenging project due to the geopolitical situation, requiring considerable effort and numerous adjustments regarding logistics, scientific personnel, and the geographical focus of the research.

Nevertheless, we can say today that these challenges were met in an outstanding manner. In fact, the necessary geographical shift of the project even led to remarkable scientific surprises and highly encouraging data.

Although we collected only about one-tenth of the number of invertebrates compared to our previous expedition in the Kuril-Kamchatka Trench, we observed a comparable level of species diversity – a truly noteworthy finding. Particularly striking is the high connectivity of certain species from the eastern Aleutian Trench, which were also found in the Kuril-Kamchatka Trench and even in the Japan Trench.

My sincere thanks go to the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) for its generous financial support, to the German Research Vessel Coordination Centre for their tireless and consistently reliable assistance, to Senckenberg for their institutional backing, and to my excellent scientific team. I would also like to thank all the researchers on board the expedition and our collaboration partners.

This was truly outstanding teamwork – thank you all!

Steffi: “The challenges were immense, but so were the rewards. But each obstacle was an opportunity to learn, adapt, and grow, both as scientists (or human being:-) and as a team – the diversity we uncovered is a testament to the wonders of the deep sea. “

Davide “Looking back on our journey, I feel a mix of pride and nostalgia. AleutBio was more than just research; it was a real adventure of personal growth and teamwork. We had some great moments, but we also faced many obstacles. However, we worked as a united team and overcame every issue. Now, seeing the results of our tenacity and hard work is very rewarding. What I will remember most is this awesome team spirit. I’m grateful for the dedication we all shared and the discoveries we made together.”

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Farewell to AleutBio. This journey has ended, but new beginnings await. Thank you for following our adventure. Here’s to the endless deep-sea discoveries yet to come and we continue to work on the AleutBio material and present our extensive data during conferences.

All the best and thanks for your participation!

Stefanie Kaiser, Davide Di Franco und Angelika Brandt, Senckenberg Society for Nature Research