To turn a book about the ocean into a wild safari just add exuberance, says Adrian Barnett
The Extreme Life of the Sea by Stephen R. Palumbi and Anthony R. Palumbi, Princeton University Press, $27.95/£19.95 IF YOU have ever woken up way too hot under a thick duvet, but with your feet poking out and freezing, then spare a thought for the Pompeii worm. It suffers the reverse problem: while its head pokes into the frigid waters of the abyssal ocean, its hind end lies close to the super-heated water of a hydrothermal vent. How this amazing annelid tolerates a temperature difference that may reach 80 °C is just one of the remarkable stories told by marine biologist Stephen Palumbi and his science journalist son, Anthony, in The Extreme Life of the Sea. They have organised this unapologetic celebration by superlative, ranging from “The Oldest” and “The Smallest” to “The Strangest Family Lives”. It’s a format that allows the Palumbis to explore common threads across a huge diversity of marine life, looking at extraordinary and extreme adaptations. And it also reminds us that the ocean can be both harsh and benign in the same wave beat. For example, a chapter called “The Shallowest”, dedicated to marine life at the very edge of the sea, outlines the rigours of an existence where sun and sea alternate, and where the position of a species on a rock is defined by Extreme hunger: a fangtooth chases an abyssal hatchet fish its ability to resist one of two main killers – desiccation or predation. In the same chapter we meet the Shingle sea urchin, which inhabits the surf zone. It’s the subject of elegant experiments to discover whether its suckedpastille shape or super-strong sticky feet are key to resisting the near-perpetual pounding in which it feeds and breeds. Close to shore, the Palumbis float with some Immortal jellyfish, a species that seems to have halted the ageing process and which simply continues forever. Hollywood, they note, is interested. Back out in the deep sea there is the Sailfish, corralling prey with its huge dorsal fins. The Sailfish has an unusual trick that helps it feed on the frenetically moving bait: it warms its eyes and optic nerves to speed up response times to match the quicksilver desperation of the escaping prey. The trick, say the Palumbis, lies in brown muscle tissue and its heat-generating shivers. Deep, deep down and the Palumbis guide us through hydrothermal vents, abyssal plains and the life that feeds on dead whales. Then we speed on to the polar zones and death-defying icefish, with ice-crystal-grabbing blood proteins. The whole safari is conducted with a verve and joy that only “ This celebration also reminds us that the ocean can be harsh and benign in the same wave beat” comes from a deep love of the subject, a life-long dedication to its exploration and a true communicator’s sense of the mot juste. This experience and range means the Palumbis can write comfortably about research and researchers, and about the physical and mental exploration of the ocean’s ecology. We learn a lot through their engaging tales of William Beebe and Otis Barton’s bathyspheric descents in the 1920s and 1930s, and more esoteric lessons from Anne Stephenson’s studies of the barnacle’s resilience to desiccation. And coming closer to today, they discuss marine biologists Lawrence Pomeroy and Farooq Azam and their studies of Prochlorococcus, a tiny cyanobacteria found in the 1980s. This is so plentiful that it is a good candidate for most abundant creature on Earth. The only thing spoiling this splendid book are the illustrations, which feel too few and too static to accompany such a dynamic text. Luckily, the publishers will be launching an enhanced e-book version soon, complete with a cargo of videos to complement the text. ■
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