BathyBot: a deep-sea crawler to see the unseen of the NW Mediterranean Sea

Increasing exploration and industrial exploitation of the vast and fragile deep-ocean environment for a wide range of resources (e.g., oil, gas, fisheries, new molecules, and soon, minerals) raises global concerns about potential ecological impacts. BathyBot is a multi-instrumented deep-sea crawler deployed from a dock, at 2500m depth, 40 km off the French coast (Mediterranean Sea), at the EMSO-LO station. BathyBot is connected to a deep sea cabled observatory allowing real-time observations of the deep sea. The deployment of this benthic internet operated vehicle complements the ALBATROSS-MII mooring line in the pelagic, multi-instrumented with oceanographic sensors. Two cameras are installed on BathyBot for real time imaging of the deep sea, as well as an Underwater Video Profiler on its dock, and a biocamera closeby the vehicle. Such instrumentation allowed: 1) to better understand the biodiversity in the deep Mediterranean Sea over time and to detect months where some organisms have a higher activity at this deep station 2) to involve citizen through the diffusion of images acquired by BathyBot through a citizen science platform “Ocean Spy – Mediterranean Spy”.