Actiniaria Amblyraja hyperborea Amphidiscella monai Amphipoda Antedonidae Aphrocallistidae Asbestopluma (Asbestopluma) furcata Ascidiacea Asconema foliatum Asconema megaatrialia Asteroidea Bathycrinus carpenterii Bathyphellia margaritacea Beroe sp. Bivalvia Brachiopoda Bryozoa Buccinidae Caprellidae Caridea Catherinum striolatum Caulophacus (Caulophacus) arcticus Cirroteuthis muelleri Cladorhiza spp. Colossendeis proboscidea Crossota sp. Ctenophora Decapodiformes Demospongiae: Fan-shaped sponges Elpidia sp. Gaidropsarus argentatus Gastropoda Gersemia spp. Gorgonocephalus sp. Hexadella dedritifera Hymedesmiidae Hymenaster sp. Irregularia Isopoda Keratoisididae Kolga hyalina Lissodendoryx (Lissodendoryx) complicata Lucernaria bathyphila Lycenchelys platyrhina Lycodes frigidus Macrourus berglax Molgula sp. Nemertea Neohela sp. Nudibranchia Ophiuroidea Paraliparis bathybius Polymastiidae Polynoidae Psychrolutidae Ptychogastria polaris Pycnogonida Reinhardtius hippoglossoides Rhodichthys regina Rossellidae: Schaudinnia rosea / Trichasterina borealis / Scyphidium septentrionale Sabellidae Serpulidae Siboglinidae Stauromedusae Stylocordyla borealis Tentorium sp. Tetractinellida Tubulariidae Umbellula encrinus

Ophiuroidea

E: Brittle stars, N: Slangestjerner

Identification

Morphology: Round central disc with 5 thin arms.
Size: Most species with disc diameter 3-50 mm (largest up to 150 mm disc diameter). Arms usually 2-3 x disc diameter (some species 20+ times disc diameter) (Stöhr et al., 2012).

Habitat

Substrate: Both hard and soft substrate. Highest densities observed on sediments in the ROV video material, but brittle stars can also aggregate on hard substrate.

Ecology

Life History

Comments

References

Stöhr, Sabine and O'Hara, Timothy D. and Thuy, Ben (2012). Global Diversity of Brittle Stars (Echinodermata: Ophiuroidea). PLOS ONE. DOI Link

Depth: 1110 m.

Image by DeepInsight-2025 (ÆGIR6000/NORMAR)

Distance between lasers: 10 cm.

Depth: 1058 m.

Image by DeepInsight-2025 (ÆGIR6000/NORMAR)

Depth: 1159 m.

Image by: DeepInsight-2023

Taxonomy Summary

Phylum Echinodermata
Class Ophiuroidea

Nudibranchia Index

Paraliparis bathybius

MorphoCat is an image catalog of deep-sea benthic morphotaxa. The catalog contains images of morphotaxa encountered in deep-sea environments of the Norwegian and Arctic Ocean, sourced from ROV video footage. No physical specimens have been analyzed; therefore, all identifications represent current hypotheses based solely on visible morphological characteristics and the presence of the taxa in relevant areas presented in literature.

MorphoCat started as internal notes in mid 2023 to support our work training DeepSee, our object detection model for ROV video analysis during the collaboration between Bergwerk and Aker BP (Iyer et al. 2025). It was never intended to be more than an internal reference, but we realized it could be genuinely valuable to share. Please note that MorphoCat is not intended as an authoritative taxonomic reference. For verified taxonomic standards, we encourage consulting dedicated authoritative catalogs.

It's a living resource — we'll keep adding to it as our work continues. Let us know if you have any suggestions or would like to contribute.

Acknowledgements

The ROV videos were received from scientific cruises connected to the EMINENT project (Energy Minerals for the Net Zero Transition), the GoNorth 2022 expedition, and numerous cruises by the Centre for Deep Sea Research, UiB and the Norwegian Offshore Directorate (NOD). Many of the associated cruise reports are available via the Norwegian Offshore Directorate.

With the exception of the DeepInsight-2023, NOD-2018, and NOD-2019 cruises, all videos and images were collected using the ROV Ægir6000, operated by the Norwegian Marine Robotics Facility (NORMAR) located at the University of Bergen.

All scientific data and imagery are owned by the respective cruise operators or research institutions.

We are grateful for the broader scientific community’s ongoing efforts to verify and standardize benthic morphotaxa naming conventions. We acknowledge the valuable foundational work provided by resources such as the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS), the Norwegian Biodiversity Information Centre (Artsdatabanken), the SMarTaR-ID initiative, and the Norwegian Deep Sea Image Catalogue by Meyer et al.

List of expeditions

As expeditions are often referred to by multiple designations, the list below details the common name alongside the official identifiers used by the Norwegian Offshore Directorate (NOD) and the University of Bergen (UiB), where applicable:

DeepInsight-2025 (NOD: 2025-EMINENT-01, UiB: KH25-263)
NOD/UiB-2024 (NOD: 2024-NOD-02, UiB: KH24-254)
UiB-2024 (UiB: Centre for Deep Sea Research, GS24-258)
DeepInsight-2023 (NOD: 2023-EMINENT-01)
GoNorth-2022 (NOD: 2022-GoN-01, UiB: KH22-245)
NOD-2019 (NOD: 2019-NPD-01)
NOD-2018 (NOD: 2018-NPD-01)

Disclaimer

We have decided to open this for public use, but note this is not intended to be a complete catalogue; rather, it is a library of the lifeforms we commonly see on ROV video footage from the Norwegian deep seafloor and we do not guarantee its correctness. This catalog has not undergone formal verification by taxonomists and should not be used as an authoritative taxonomic source.

How to Cite

If you use MorphoCat in your research or projects, please cite it as follows:

Marnor, C. M., Hartz, E. H. & Schmid, D. W. (2026). MorphoCat: An image catalog of deep-sea benthic morphotaxa. Bergwerk. https://morphocat.bergwerk.com

Updated: 2026-04-21