MAMBA Cruise 2009

Route

MAMBA 2009 Cruise Team:

Michail Yakimov (IAMC-CNR Messina, Chief of Expedition); Violetta La Cono, Luis Monticelli, Francesco Smedile (IAMC-CNR Messina); Mireno Borghini, Francesca Polonelli (ISMAR-CNR La Spezia); Stephane L’Haridon, Laurent Toffin (UBO); Sharon Cheryl, Elizabeth Edwards (University of Toronto).

MAMBA 2009 On-board activities:

1. to collect and concentrate some thousand l of brine of L’Atlante basin for consequent DNA extraction and large-insert library production at Bangor University;
2. to set up a series of cultures for stable isotope probing and enrichments with 13C stable isotopes from the brine samples;
3. to do the same for interface samples and superficial seawater.

During the 13 days of cruise MAMBA 09, planned on the results achieved by cruise R/V Urania we performed the successful sampling of thalassic and athalassic brines and of overlying waters at 17 sampling stations, including very accurate sub-sampling of brine/seawater interface; sampling of the sea bottom at 15 stations, 14 anoxic and 1 oxic environments; 750 Km of high resolution SBP profiles, that were useful for the detection of the brine interface and their mapping.