Marine biology: The Deep Ocean

TED Studies, created in collaboration with Wiley, are curated video collections — supplemented by rich educational materials — for students, educators and self-guided learners. In The Deep Ocean, aquatic explorers take the TED stage to share what they've seen in the abyss of Earth's last frontier: the deep ocean, home to massive underwater mountains and valleys, giant smoking chimneys and an amazing array of animals. Relevant areas of interest, study and coursework include: biological oceanography, chemical oceanography, geological oceanography, ocean engineering, ecology, sustainable consumption, resource management, cinematography, genomics and evolution.

Learning outcomes

TED’s The Deep Ocean will enable learners to:

  • Understand that the ocean provides goods and services for humankind and that it is critical in maintaining the Earth System for all life on the planet
  • Appreciate the enormous diversity of life in the ocean, the incredible adaptations to what we consider as extreme environments and the lack of knowledge on large parts of the deep sea
  • Identify and evaluate serious threats posed to the ocean, marine life and the goods and services they provide by unsustainable human activities, such as overexploitation of fisheries, pollution, and also global climate change
  • Learn about the technologies now available to explore, understand and monitor the ocean
  • Demonstrate that new approaches can be used to restore the health and conserve the largest habitat on Earth. These new approaches include ecosystem-based management and marine protected areas, enabled by technology and also policy that reflects the importance of the ocean to humankind.

Relevant talks


About the educator

TED Studies professor: Alex Rogers

Alex Rogers is a marine biologist whose research focuses on deep-sea ecosystems including hydrothermal vents, cold-water coral habitats and seamounts. Rogers is a Professor of Conservation Biology at the University of Oxford.


About TED Studies

TED Studies created in partnership with
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Each TED Study offers a curated and sequenced set of TED Talks, along with specially commissioned materials for teaching and self-guided learning. Created by world class experts, they cover topics ranging from "Understanding Happiness" to "Covering World News" to "Ecofying Cities." An abbreviated version of TED Studies is offered here; the full curricula — including special modules on each talk with questions, assignments, key terms and recommended reading — are available for licensing to academic institutions, ministries of education, and media companies worldwide.

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