Scientists at the Marine Biology Station Piran, National Institute of Biology on the Slovenian coast joined researchers around the globe in a worldwide Ocean Sampling Day (OSD) on 21st of June 2014. Ocean Sampling Day is the first global, simultaneous sampling of microbes in ocean, coastal and Great Lakes waters. The sampling will be conducted at more than 160 marine research locations from Iceland to Antarctica and from Moorea in French Polynesia to South Africa. The sampling program will support international missions to provide information on the diversity of microbes, their function and their potential economic benefits.

MBP/NIB scientists will collect and process samples in the Bay of Piran at the Oceanographic Buoy Vida sampling station. This activity will also be a part of an on-going water-quality monitoring program that MBP has supported for more than 15 years. The sampling program is coordinated jointly by Jacobs University in Bremen, Germany and the University of Oxford, U.K. The effort was launched under the umbrella of the European-funded project Micro B3, which aims to boost marine research and innovation opportunities. The outcome of this global effort will be nothing less than the biggest data set in marine research that has ever been taken on one single day.

Researchers that participated at the sampling were David Verlič, Tihomir Makovec, Tinkara Tinta and Valentina Turk.
 

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