A research team at the University of Aberdeen have developed a revolutionary 3D holographic camera, which will give scientists a greater understanding of marine life.

The new and unique underwater camera can take 3D images is currently on board the fisheries research vessel Scotia. The first images from the voyage using the camera have been taken this week and are of a plankton copepod at a depth of 70m in the North Sea.

The camera takes is capable of taking images of living organisms and particles in their natural environment, in a non-intrusive and non-destructive way and will help enhance our awareness of the environment and provide a better understanding of the health of the oceans.

The camera has joined the team on board the Scotia, operated by the FRS Marine Laboratory, Aberdeen, during its voyage which began last week.

A couple of research scientists, Dr Hongyue Sun (University of Aberdeen) and Dr Gary Craig (CDL) have been preparing the camera for its voyage and will operate the camera on board the Scotia.

“eHoloCam” is supported by the DTI and will be out at sea on its first two-week ‘trials cruise’ to the Faroes Channel.

Professor John Watson, lead scientist from the University’s team, described the launch as a crucial development in subsea holography. He said: “This project underlines the pioneering role which the University of Aberdeen plays in the field of optical marine technology.

“eHoloCam has been an exciting project to co-ordinate and be a part of. Holography can provide marine biologists with information that has been difficult or impossible for them to obtain by other means, and it is our hope that, as the power and benefits of the technique are realised, our system will find widespread use amongst the marine biological community and will prove to be an invaluable tool in biological science.

“Improved knowledge of plankton species, location and distribution will help to enhance our awareness of the environment and provide a better understanding of the health of the oceans and its influence, for example, on fish stocks.“

The ‘trials cruise’ will be an ideal opportunity to evaluate the performance of this radically new instrument and will demonstrate how holography can open up new avenues of data gathering for marine scientists. It will record high-resolution holographic images of a 35,000mm3 volume (a column about 400mm long by 10mm diameter) of water to depths of 1.5 km underwater.

The “eHoloCam” is a further development of the highly successful “HoloMar” camera which was successfully launched by the University a few years ago and featured in the 2002 Guiness Book of Records as the most advanced holographic underwater camera.

Significant advances have been made to the new camera. In the new version of the HoloCam, the photographic film is replaced by all digital capture of the holograms allowing almost instaneous viewing of the holographic images. In addition, the “eHoloCam” is one sixth of the volume and one twentieth of the weight of the original HoloMar camera.

The camera has been developed jointly by the University of Aberdeen, CDLtd of Aberdeen, who specialise in offshore instrumentation, and Elforlight of Daventry (developers of compact solid state lasers).

The “eHolocam” uses a fast-pulsed laser, specially developed for the project by Elforlight. Computer replay of the holographic images will allow identification of species, recording of relative location and measurement of concentrations of the marine community. Any marine organisms captured, from about 0.1mm to several millimetres size, within this volume will be imaged to a resolution of about 10 mm (much less than the width of a hair).

Mr Colin Crichton, CEO of CDLtd, who developed the control software and designed the subsea housing and associated internal control hardware, said: “This work portrays an exciting blend of state-of-the-art optical and electronic technology with traditional offshore technology and demonstrates the advantages of academia and industry working together to explore new areas of science and technology. This new technology offers extensive opportunities for underwater instrumentation in the oil and gas industry.”

Mr Keith Oakes, designer of the compact laser, said: “The eHoloCam project has given Elforlight the opportunity to carry out a number of developments to our pulsed laser - namely to increase the coherence length, reduce the size and improve the beam quality. It has been fascinating for me to learn something about the state of the art of electronic holographic techniques during the project.”

John Dunn, who is leading the research cruise, added: “Having the holographic camera on the A.R.I.E.S. sampling system is a very exciting development in the next generation of sampling equipment. I think it will be an extremely powerful tool in trying to monitor and understand complex plankton communities.”