Last week, MBARI scientists, engineers, and communicators attended the inaugural MidSEC 2026 Conference, held June 13–19 at Bäckaskog Castle in Sweden. This conference marked the first in-person gathering of the Midwater Science and Engineering Community (MidSEC), a new international initiative founded with the goal of uniting the global midwater research and engineering community to advance collaboration, data sharing, and policy impact for the largest habitat on Earth. 

MidSEC 2026 brought together researchers, engineers, policymakers, data managers, science communicators, and conservationists for presentations, technology showcases, and focused discussion sessions. Ten MBARI staff attended the conference, sharing the institute’s decades of midwater research and technology expertise with our peers from around the world.

Karen Osborn—curator of polychaetes, peracarids, and plankton at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History and an MBARI adjunct—co-led the conference’s organizing committee. MBARI Senior Scientists Bruce Robison and Kelly Benoit-Bird were part of a distinguished group of six speakers from leading international ocean research organizations who delivered plenary talks during the conference. A range of additional MBARI staff also presented work spanning diverse disciplines from imaging innovation and midwater ecology to underwater video analysis and outreach. Several former MBARI staff, including past interns and postdoctoral fellows, also participated in MidSEC 2026, highlighting MBARI’s leadership in the field of midwater science.

MBARI was a co-sponsor of the MidSEC 2026 conference, underscoring the institute’s commitment to collaboration. MBARI researchers hope the MidSEC workgroup will build a stronger, more connected midwater science community, one that can coordinate more effectively on research, conservation, and education about this vast and understudied realm.

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