Project Partners

Funding has been provided by:

• The Natural Environment Research Council and UKRI fund Project Ultra as part of their research strategy for addressing issues of immediate societal concern.
• Industrial partners: Equinor A/S and Green Minerals A/S, are each sponsoring PhD students working on the project.
• UK and international academic partners: Cardiff University, University of Southampton, University of Leeds, GEOMAR (Germany), University of Bergen (Norway), and Memorial University (Canada).

Academic partners

Project Ultra involves academic partners from Cardiff, Southampton and Leeds Universities, GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel (Germany), University of Bergen (Norway), and industry partners (Equinor A/S) supporting data collection, PhD students, and providing links with end-users.

National Oceanography Centre

National Oceanography Centre (NOC) has been engaged in research around all aspects deep-sea minerals, leading research programmes for the past 30 years. NOC has a balanced portfolio of research in to deep-sea mineral. Recent major projects on the science around the formation and preservation deep-sea minerals include Blue Mining and MarineE-tech, while other research is on the environment and ecology associated with these deposits and include Midas and Smartex. The Ocean BioGeoscicence Group leads Project Ultra and will undertake research into the formation, alteration and preservation of these seabed mineral deposits.

British Geological Survey

British Geological Survey provides both scientific and technical partnerships to Project Ultra, and will lead the scientific effort to explore the resource potential of ultramafic hosted seafloor massive sulphide deposits in terms of their mineralogy, composition, size and abundance. Their Marine Geoscience Group will bring the robotic seafloor drilling rig to enable research in to the sub-seafloor. This crucial technology will enable us to core the sub-seafloor ore bodies and their host rocks, and cap the boreholes such that we can re-visit to sample fluids and microbes at a later date.

Cardiff University

Cardiff University has a dedicated Centre for Solid Earth and Natural Resources, hosted by the School of Earth and Ocean Sciences, and is involved in all aspects of the assessment of the resource potential of ultramafic-hosted seafloor mineral deposits. In particular they are involved in the wider magmatic and tectonic environment in which the mineral deposits are formed.

University of Southampton

University of Southampton has a long history of deep-sea hydrothermal research including chemistry, biology and ore forming processes. For example, the School of Ocean and Earth Sciences manages the DOSI project that looks at the impacts of human activity in the deep ocean. In Project Ultra, the University will oversee hydrothermal fluid studies and mineral alteration studies.

University of Leeds

University of Leeds has a long record of applied geology research, especially around ore-forming processes. Their School of Earth and Environment will focus on the biotic interactions with mineral deposits both on and below the seafloor. In particular, they will work with partners at the Centre for Deep Sea Research, at the University of Bergen to study microbial activity in and beneath the seafloor and how it might change the nature of seafloor ore deposits.

Industrial partners

Industrial partners, Green Minerals A/S and Equinor A/S are both Norwegian companies sponsoring PhD students in Project Ultra. They are interested in supporting the project through the development of associated research into developing novel geophysics techniques for sub-seafloor imaging, understanding the role of mineral alteration, and determining the history of hydrothermal activity.