Most folks will never get to comb the ocean’s depths, but the Port Townsend Marine Science Center is hosting a speaker who can share what it’s like to discover new locales and life forms under the sea.

Dr. Paul Yancey, senior research scientist and professor emeritus of biology at Whitman College in Walla Walla, will serve as the guest speaker of the next installment in the Marine Science Center’s “The Future of Oceans” lecture series.

Yancey’s free lecture on Sunday, Feb. 16, “Animals of Extreme Habitats in the Deep Sea,” addresses how Earth’s undersea environment is also the planet’s largest and least explored habitat, where life thrives in spite of extreme darkness, cold and scarce food supplies.

Yancey also plans to highlight how deep-sea life forms’ ecosystems are being threatened by human pollution, as well as how those species’ physiological adaptations are being studied for their potential medical and structural benefits to humans.

Yancey will discuss research conducted through expeditions to hydrothermal vents off the coast of British Columbia, hydrocarbon seeps off the coast of Oregon, and major trench explorations using submersibles, as well as the notable discoveries of creatures that  have been featured in nature documentaries by the BBC, the Discovery+ Channel and the Japanese NHK Broadcasting Corporation.

“Through my involvement in such research, I’ve been exposed to a lot of species, technology and geological features that most people don’t get to see for themselves,” Yancey said. “Ninety percent of the ocean floor has gone unseen by humans, and even sonar mapping has only managed to cover something like 26% of it. It’s mind-boggling how little we still know.”

Unfortunately, Yancey confirmed that even relatively unexplored depths such as the Mariana Trench, the deepest oceanic trench on Earth, have nonetheless been contaminated by traces of human garbage.

“For a lot of us, the ocean’s depths are out of sight, out of mind, but that doesn’t mean we’re not still affecting them,” Yancey said. “However unexplored these places are, they’re no longer untouched or pristine.”

Yancey nonetheless gets a kick out of more positive discoveries, such as how the extreme conditions of undersea vents, seeps and tectonic trenches can still sustain life forms such as giant tubeworms, amphipods and the Mariana snailfish.

“My own research specializes in pressure adaptations, such as how animals have adapted to deep-sea pressures through molecules that help them resist the weight of those depths,” Yancey said. “This is relevant to human illnesses such as glaucoma, which becomes more of a risk with high eye pressure, because when laboratory rats were treated with molecules from deep-sea animals that can bear up against high pressure, it lowered their blood pressure.”

Yancey conceded that his outlook on the future of hydrothermal vents was a bit more mixed, since many minerals can be found at those vents that are valuable to humans, such as lithium for electric vehicle batteries, but that also makes them more likely to be exploited in ways that could compromise the surrounding environment.

“These are spaces with both unique species and unique resources, so we need to be more aware of them,” Yancey said.