In the last week of June, the MAnDAriN project (Marine Annelid Diversity of Arctic Norway, homepage here) went for another* field trip to the areas around Tromsø. This time we were focused on intertidal sampling in the inner fjords. Figure 1. Different habitats sampled during the second field trip of MAnDAriN to Tromsø area (Photo by N. Budaeva). Besides Nataliya and Tom, the sampling team included a dedicated young naturalist interested in digging up worms on the mudflats and watching for seabirds. Figure 2. Sampling of marine annelids (polychaetes) (Photo by N. Budaeva). Two researchers ..read more

Fresh off the press: “Diversity of Orbiniella (Orbiniidae, Annelida) in the North Atlantic and the Arctic“, published in ZooKeys. DOI: 10.3897/zookeys.1205.120300 (link goes to paper, it is Open Access) In this recent publication, PhD candidate Miguel and his co-authors present three new species of marine bristle worms (polychaeta) in the family Orbiniidae, all from the genus Orbiniella. The work focused on studying the diversity of the group from the North Atlantic and the Arctic, and has used a combination of molecular and morphological analyses. The new species have been na ..read more

From 21 till 28th of May, researchers, technicians, and students of the University Museum’s marine section, travelled up North to Torsvåg, close to Tromsø, for joint fieldwork. The participants represented several Artsdatabanken projects that cover marine fungi, hydrozoans, polychaetes, parasites of jellyfish, comb jellies and chaetognaths, bryozoans, marine amphipods and finally the Lower Heterobranchia and Pyramidellidae gastropods. In this blog you can read about the general experience of the fieldwork and more details about the different projects. And here you can read about the fieldwork ..read more

“Ooh ooh ooh! I found a parasite! Bonita!” – A phrase not usually heard in the fishing harbor of Torsvåg! But this week was far from the usual fishing business. Lea (left) and Eva (right) out sampling on the boat. Photos: Eva Samson & Nataliya Budaeva Heisann! We are Eva and Lea, and we’re marine biology students in the second semester of our masters degree. Since we’re writing our master’s theses at the University Museum, we got to be a part of the fieldwork in Torsvåg (Troms) in the last week of May. Welcome to our first sampling trip with the researchers from the University Museum o ..read more

Torsvåg lighthouse. Graphic from norgeskart.no)   During the last week of May, eleven of us in “the marine group” went on fieldwork together, up far north. Based in Torsvåg (see map), we’ve collected material for several species mapping projects supported by the Norwegian Taxonomy Initiative (Artsprosjektet).   The UMB participants. From back left: Joan, Jon, Tom, Nataliya, Katrine, Cessa, Marta (guest of NOAH). Front from left: Lea, Luis, Eva and Praveen The fieldwork originated from the collaboration between the projects “Norwegian Marine Fungi” (Teppo Rämä, UiT), “NOAH – Norwe ..read more

Since September 2023, a new taxonomic project started at the University Museum studying the biodiversity of sea snails (with shell) and sea slugs (without (visible) shell) in Norwegian marine habitats. This project is in a way a follow up from the “Sea slugs of Southern Norway” project between 2018–2020, but this time with a focus on poorly studied habitats including seagrass meadows, maerl coralline algae beds and landlocked fjords (“polls”). The target groups of this project are tiny sea snails of just a few millimeters, which are part of a group called “Lower” Heterobranchia and Pyramidelli ..read more

From April 13th to 19th 2024, the Ocean City of Bergen celebrated the ocean even more than usual(!) in a happening called One Ocean Week (OOW). One Ocean Week held conferences, meetings, workshops and activities – aiming to pioneer a sustainable use of the ocean. The marine group at the University Museum was a prolific participant during the event, here are some of our contributions!     Anne Helene was invited to give the opening talk at the reception in the Aula, placing the Museum and Bergen into the heart of the Norwegian ocean exploration beginning with “The Norwegian North-Atl ..read more

Katrine ran an activity on moss animals – Bryozoa – during the Family Day of OneOceanWeek in Bergen and part of our three-museum collaboration project NorDigBryo – Digitizing Norwegian Bryozoa. The full text in English is out now on the NorDigBryo project blog, and the Norwegian version can be found here – check it out! And make sure you are following our Moss animal adventures on Instagram: @NorDigBryo Here is what an AI generated “moss animal” may look like – it not *quite* how they look in reality! Made with DallE ..read more

Make sure to check out the seminars that are happening this week (April 16th-19th)! Researchers from the Department of Natural History give 30 minute lectures on selected topics in the marine realm each day at 14:00, read more about it here! LINK: https://www.uib.no/en/universitymuseum/169739/welcome-one-ocean-seminars-university-museum Topics, dates and times: Who eats whom? Marine worms with jaws – delicious and dangerous! 16.04.2024 – 14.00–14.30 Jellyfish in Norway – mostly harmless or murderous monsters? 17.04.2024 – 14.00–14.30 Sharks of Norway 18.04.2024 – 14.00–15.0 ..read more

Hi, I am Alina Lösing, a bachelor’s student from Germany with the great opportunity to join the Cnidaria and Ctenophora team from the University Museum of Bergen for a 6 weeks Internship. This experience was not only a chance to further strengthen my passion in marine biology but also very helpful to gain valuable insight into research and museum operations. During my time at the museum, I had the chance to join various projects of Joan J. Soto-Angel, including POLE2POLE (Horizon 2020, MSCA) on bipolarity, and Artsprosjektet NoAH (Artsdatabanken) on Norwegian Arctic Hydrozoa. I even had the ho ..read more