Dr. Stacy Kim

A Benthic Ecologist and long-time Antarctica diver, Stacy Kim studies seafloor creatures and marine life communities in waters below freezing! Her team is developing and working with SCINI, the Submersible Capable of Under Ice Navigation and Imaging that can go to depths below those accessible to divers.

Dr. Stacy Kim first went to Antarctica as a researcher and diver in 1988. She is now on the research faculty at Moss Landing Marine Laboratories in Moss Landing, California, and does scientific work with her team in Antarctica during the Austral Spring season.

SCINI (pronounced like "skinny") is an ROV, a remotely operated vehicle, specifically built to deploy through the frozen ocean surface in polar regions. SCINI is capable of being deployed through smaller holes in the ice than those required by divers, and can be used with less logistical support than that needed to sustain human divers. SCINI is equipped with a great imaging device allowing the team to view and capture digital images from depths below those accessible by human divers on SCUBA equipment. You can learn more about Stacy, her team and SCINI on their fantastic website! The website also includes a great blog maintained during their most recent deployment in Antarctica.

People who have inspired Stacy in her Antarctic research and diving include Dr. John Oliver of Moss Landing Marine Laboratories, one of the early Antarctica marine ecology research divers, and Dr. Paul Dayton of Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Paul Dayton was one of the pioneers of Antarctica research diving in the 1960s. There is a wonderful short video by Scripps Institution of Oceanography student J.J. Newman about Paul Dayton's first Antarctic diving available. Stacy and her team have done research work in Antarctica that includes following up on deeper water experiments begun decades ago by Paul Dayton under the Antarctic ice. You can read more about this work on The Scientist website, and see a video about SCINI there as well.

Another project of Stacy's involves students at the Watsonville Adult Education center in Watsonville, California. Students reseached and created a variety of beautiful prayer flags representing all of the nations that are signatories to the Antarctic Treaty. These flags were then taken to Antarctica by Stacy and her team to be displayed at the U.S. Antarctic Base, McMurdo Station. The flags are also part of a research study involving the katabatic winds of Antarctica. Here is a brief video about the Watsonville Prayer Flags in Antarctica: