The new **enrichment/colonization experiment** began in May 2014 at the Barkley Canyon site of the NEPTUNE observatory. Led by Professor Craig Smith of the University of Hawaii at Manoa, Professor Lisa Levin, from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, and by ONC staff scientist Fabio De Leo, this deep-sea community sucession experiment uses subsea cameras to observe the changes in the seafloor communities (invertebrates and fish) triggered by the implantation of various organic and inorganic substrates such as **whale bones, wood and authigenic carbonate**. Whalebones and driftwood form chemosynthetic substrate habitats on the deep seafloor after being decomposed by specialized bacteria, attracting a distinct benthic fauna that resembles communities living in the extreme environments of hydrothermal vents and cold (methane) seeps. This type of experiment also sheds light into how benthic organisms utilize the sparse food resources available in deep-sea settings. This advanced ocean observatory technology allows researchers to monitor early community colonization and sucessional processes in ways never before possible, at high-frequency and high-resolution. "This is the first time we are able to control our observations in deep water by recording the experiments on a daily basis every two hours and turning on the lights at any time to make further observations." – said Dr. Fabio De Leo, ONC staff scientist. Previously, those types of experiments could only be monitored by sporadic revisits by ROVs or submersibles, or by autonomous free-vehicles, meaning a lot of the patterns of faunal colonization and succession could not be resolved.