How Deep is Your Love

Cast and Scientists

• Barbie Pig (species unknown)

  Sea cucumber (echninoderm)

  

  Nicknamed 'barbie pig' by ecologist Bethany Fleming, this lil fella hangs out on the sea floor, moving slowly, devouring sediment as they go.

• Dr Lupita Bribiesca Contreras

  Scientist (homo sapiens)

  

  Lupita is a deep-sea biologist interested in biogeography, evolution, and echinoderms. If she was a deep sea creature she would be a swimming sea cucumber.

• Ping Pong Sponge (species unknown)

  Sponge

  

  Nicknamed the Ping Pong Sponge by the scientists, this animal could be housing lots of much smaller animals.

• Caspar the ghost octopus

  Species Unknown (Mullusca)

  

  This octopus, nicknamed Caspar the ghost, has not yet been given a latin name by scientists.

• Bethany Fleming

  deep sea biologist (homo sapiens)

  

  Bethany is deep sea ecologist whose work focuses on spatial and temporal patterns in the abyss.

• Psychropotes semperiana

  Gummy squirrel (echinodermata)

  

  Nicknamed 'gummy squirrel' by taxonomist Regan Drennan, scientists could only speculate what they use their 'sail' for until they filmed something unexpected on the cruise.

• Long-legged amphipod

  species unknown (arthropoda)

  

  A tiny but nevertheless charismatic crustacean.

• Eva Stewart

  Deep sea biologist (home sapiens)

  

  Eva is a PHD student studying deep sea invertebrates and recently described a new genus of starfish parasite mizostomid.

• Brachiopod

  species unknown (brachiopoda)

  

  Brachiopods are known as 'living fossils' because they are some of the oldest forms of life to exist - dating back at least 550 million years. This one lives on a polymetallic nodule.

• Psychronaetes hanseni

  Sea Cucumber (echinodermata)

  

  The big purple sea cucumber nicknamed 'The King' by the scientists. First described by taxonomist Dave Pawson in 1983.

• Dr Belen Arias

  scientist (homo sapiens)

  

  Belen is a deep-sea biologist whose work focusses on molecular approaches and population genomics to understand how organisms adapt to different environments.

• Freyella Benthophilia

  Brittle Star (echinodermata)

  

  This brittle star lives on a polymetallic nodule, raising their long legs into the water current to catch 'marine snow' (biological matter) drifting down from the shallows. Marine snow provides food for animals on the seabed.
  

• Enypniastes eximia

  The Headless Chicken Monster (echinodermata)

  

  The headless chicken monster, so named because of her similarity to a plucked chicken when swimming, has a unique form of self defence - ejecting the contents of the gut at any aggressor.

• Dr Adrian Glover

  Deep-sea Ocean Scientist (homo sapiens)

  

  Adrian leads the Deep Sea Systematics Group at the Natural History Museum in London. He has a special interest in polycheates (deep sea worms).

• Crinoid

  species and genus unknown

  

  This crinoid may be thousands of years old. Described by one crew member as a 'stick insect with tassels' it is in fact an animal not a plant, in the same family as starfish.

• Cerataspis monstrosus

  Penaeid Shrimp (arthropoda)

  

  A relative of the shallow water shrimp, this one is named 'monstrosus' because it has blue horns in its larval stage.

• Lucas King

  Marine biologist (homo sapiens)

  

  Lucas is a deep-sea biologist with a passion for squid, sea cucumbers and drawing.

• Prickly pear

  species unknown (echinodermata)

  

  This unnamed species of sea urchin seemed to be a micro habitat for lots of tiny creatures including amphipods (crustaceans).

• Dr Daniel O.B Jones

  Deep-sea ecologist (homo sapiens)

  

  Co-expedition lead Daniel Jones specialises in studying disturbance in the abyss.

• Coryphaenoides acrolepis

  chordata

  

  More commonly known as 'rattails' these fish have enormous eyes in order to see prey but nevertheless would always crash into the ROV - perhaps the light was too bright and alien for them to see?

• Neanthes Goodayi

  polychaete worm (annelida)

  

  Nicknamed nodule worm because of where he lives, this worm was recently described by Regan Drennan. Who says worms can't be cute?