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Logging a Day in the Life of a Whale

Whale specialist Natacha Aguilar De Soto of the University of La Laguna (Canary Islands) and WHOI bio-engineer Mark Johnson analyze large files of numerical data collected by digital tags (or D-tags) that had been attached to pilot whales. The tags, designed by Johnson, record depth and water temperature, the whale’s body orientation and tail strokes, the sounds emitted from and reflected back to the whale, and other sounds in the ocean. From these, they construct a picture of each dive.
(Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)