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Volcanoes of the Deep
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Program Overview
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NOVA follows a team of scientists as they journey to the Juan de
Fuca Ridge in the Pacific Ocean to study and raise hydrothermal vent
structures from the ocean floor.
The program:
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shows how JASON—a small robot with video cameras, sonar
imaging tools and lights—collects data about the smokers.
Engineers use three-dimensional images generated from the data
to design equipment that will capture, cut and haul four of the
structures.
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reviews the process by which "black smoker
chimneys"—chimneylike structures around hydrothermal
vents—form.
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explains how biologists study organisms that live on and near
the smokers, and speculates about clues the organisms might hold
regarding how life originated on Earth.
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details the recovery plan and successful raising of the four
chimneys to the surface.
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