Biodiversity's Big Wet Secret: The Global Distribution of Marine Biological Records Reveals Chronic Under-Exploration of the Deep Pelagic Ocean

Thomas J. Webb; Edward Vanden Berghe; Ron O'Dor

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0010223

Loading metrics

Open Access

Peer-reviewed

Research Article

Biodiversity's Big Wet Secret: The Global Distribution of Marine Biological Records Reveals Chronic Under-Exploration of the Deep Pelagic Ocean

Thomas J. Webb ,

* E-mail: t.j.webb@sheffield.ac.uk

Affiliation Department of Animal and Plant Sciences, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, United Kingdom
⨯
Edward Vanden Berghe,

Affiliation Ocean Biogeographic Information System, Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey, United States of America
⨯
Ron O'Dor

Affiliation Census of Marine Life, Consortium for Ocean Leadership, Washington, D. C., United States of America
⨯

Biodiversity's Big Wet Secret: The Global Distribution of Marine Biological Records Reveals Chronic Under-Exploration of the Deep Pelagic Ocean

Thomas J. Webb,
Edward Vanden Berghe,
Ron O'Dor

Published: August 2, 2010
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0010223

Reader Comments

Post a new comment on this article

2013 UPDATE to fig 2

Posted by tomwebb on 16 May 2013 at 08:25 GMT

I've created an updated version of fig 2, using 2013 OBIS data (now 19M records, 2.5x more than in our original paper here) and posted it over on Mola mola, my SciLogs blog: http://www.scilogs.com/mo... The major patterns remain the same, and most of these new records have been in previously well-studied zones; the deep pelagic remains significantly under-sampled.

No competing interests declared.

Subject Areas
?

For more information about PLOS Subject Areas, click here.
We want your feedback. Do these Subject Areas make sense for this article? Click the target next to the incorrect Subject Area and let us know. Thanks for your help!

Oceans
Is the Subject Area "Oceans" applicable to this article?

Thanks for your feedback.
Marine biology
Is the Subject Area "Marine biology" applicable to this article?

Thanks for your feedback.
Biodiversity
Is the Subject Area "Biodiversity" applicable to this article?

Thanks for your feedback.
Marine ecosystems
Is the Subject Area "Marine ecosystems" applicable to this article?

Thanks for your feedback.
Marine conservation
Is the Subject Area "Marine conservation" applicable to this article?

Thanks for your feedback.
Deep sea
Is the Subject Area "Deep sea" applicable to this article?

Thanks for your feedback.
Water columns
Is the Subject Area "Water columns" applicable to this article?

Thanks for your feedback.
Marine environments
Is the Subject Area "Marine environments" applicable to this article?

Thanks for your feedback.

Biodiversity's Big Wet Secret: The Global Distribution of Marine Biological Records Reveals Chronic Under-Exploration of the Deep Pelagic Ocean

Biodiversity's Big Wet Secret: The Global Distribution of Marine Biological Records Reveals Chronic Under-Exploration of the Deep Pelagic Ocean

Reader Comments

Post Your Discussion Comment

Why should this posting be reviewed?

Thank You!

2013 UPDATE to fig 2

Posted by tomwebb on 16 May 2013 at 08:25 GMT