Welcome to the Great Australian Bight benthic fauna scratchpad

This scratchpad documents benthic invertebrate diversity from abyssal depths in Australia. 

The current content is still dominated by the material collected as part of the first such project, in the Great Australian Bight in 2013.  However as of October 2017 taxa from subsequent surveys has also begun to be added, with the goal that these pages will eventually contain a comprehensive summary of invertebrate diversity (benthic infauna and epifauna) from abyssal depths (~2,000 m plus) currently known from Australia.  The home tab for each taxon will summarise the progress towards this goal or each group of organisms.

This scratchpad began life as the Great Australian Bight Research Program (GABRP)  - a collaboration between BP, CSIRO, the South Australian Research and Development Institute (SARDI), the University of Adelaide and Flinders University.  In 2015-2017, a collaboration between Chevron, CSIRO and Museum Victoria conducted further surveys and research in the Great Australian Bight.  In 2017, a research cruise led by Dr Tim O'Hara on RV Investigator  (IN2017 V03) conducted the first systematic syrvey of abyssal depths (2,000 m plus)  along the east coast of Australia.

More details of these programs abd a full list of collaborating taxonomists can be found at the 'About us' page.