A team of ocean scientists, led by chief scientist and Lehigh faculty member Jill McDermott, returned to port March 26 in San Diego from a research expedition in the eastern Pacific Ocean funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), where they discovered the new deep-sea hydrothermal vent sites on the seafloor at 2,550 meters (8366 feet, or 1.6 miles) depth. The venting fluids are all hotter than 300°C (570°F). The discovery was supported, and in many ways accelerated, by making use of the unique strengths offered by robotic and human exploration of the deep seafloor.