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Alan John Jamieson is a Scottish marine biologist, engineer, explorer and author, best known for his deep-sea exploration and study of life at the deepest places in the oceans. He is known for extensive use of deep-sea landers (2025). 9781118332481 ISBN 9781118332481 to establish the maximum depth and community dynamics of many organismal groups, as well as the discovery of many new species and highlighting the presence of anthropogenic impacts at full ocean depth. During the Five Deeps Expedition, and follow on expeditions in 2020, he completed various dives in a manned submersible to some of the deepest places in the world. He has published over 100 scientific papers and participated in 65 deep-sea expeditions.
Jamieson was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2024 New Year Honours for services to marine biology, subsea engineering and expoloration.
During his time at Oceanlab, he began a series of projects relating to exploring the hadal zone (depths exceeding 6000m). He designed and constructed two full ocean depth rated Benthic lander to carry baited cameras, traps and other sensors to depth of nearly 11,000m. Between 2007 and 2013 he participated in and often led a series of seagoing expeditions that included the first finding of the taxonomic order Decapoda at hadal depths (including the deepest prawn ever found), the first video of fish greater than 6000m, filmed the deepest fish in the southern hemisphere, the deepest fish ever filmed (at the time), the deepest eel ever found, and the first footage and discovery of the 'Alicella' at hadal depths. These were achieved across a series 11 expeditions spanning the Japan Trench, Izu–Bonin, Mariana Trench, Kermadec Trench, New Hebrides, Tonga Trench and Peru–Chile trenches in collaboration with the University of Tokyo's Atmosphere and Ocean Research Institute (AORI; Japan) and the National Institute for Water and Atmospheric research (NIWA; New Zealand). These expeditions also saw the discovery of a hadal Amphipoda species later to be named after him: Princaxelia jamiesoni.
In 2014, Jamieson was a co-Principal investigator on the joint US–UK–NZ Hades projects: Hades-K to the Kermadec Trench and Hades-M to the Mariana Trench. The former was the first expedition to use the HROV Nereus to full scientific capacity. The vehicle was lost during this expedition, but by using spare parts and scrap metal, Jamieson constructed a full ocean depth lander, known as the Wee Trap, that days later captured the deepest fish ever caught, Pseudoliparis swirei. On the second expedition, to the Mariana Trench, he set a new record for the deepest fish (the 'Ethereal snailfish' at 8145 metres deep) and the first video footage of the supergiant amphipod, Alicella gigantea.
From 2015 to 2017, Jamieson led the ' PharmaDEEP' expedition to the South Shetland Trench in Antarctica on the Spanish naval ship BIO Hesperides and participated in the Japanese RV Shinyo Maru expedition to the Mariana Trench in 2017, with the Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology for the Discovery Channel documentary Deep Ocean, Descent into the Mariana Trench, produced by NHK.
Some of his recent papers includes the deepest cephalopod (octopus) and deepest squid ever filmed, description of the DSV Limiting Factor full ocean depth submersible, a review of the deepest places in each ocean, and a contribution to an industrial scheme to eliminate plastic pollution with Andrew Forrest of the Minder Foundation.
A replica of Jamieson's third Hadal-Lander was constructed and used in a sequence in Episode 2 ( The Deep) of the documentary Blue Planet II. The Hadal-Lander is seen descending into a CG model of a subduction trench, alongside some footage obtained during Hades-K and Hades-M.
He was a guest presenter at New Scientist Live at the ExCeL London centre in September 2017 n38 where he also joined BBC World Service's Science in Action live panel show with Roland Pease. He presented at Ocean TEDx KingsPark on 1 December 2021, and took the audience into the deepest ocean where few humans who have dived, including 11 km down in the Mariana Trench.
In 2022 he led an expedition to the Diamantina fracture zone in the East Indian Ocean where his team discovered the deepest fish off mainland Australia at a depth of 6177 metres.
His zoological author abbreviation is Jamieson. He has co-authored the description of 12 new species.
During the expedition he descended to a depth of 7180m in the Sunda Trench, and then to 10,710m in Sirena Deep in the Mariana Trench, 7200m in the Puerto Rico Trench and 2000m in the Arctic Ocean with Victor Vescovo. The first of these dives made him the first British citizen to reach hadal depths, and the second of these dives, made him the 8th deepest diving human in history.
Jamieson rejoined the DSSV Pressure Drop in February 2020 for Caladan Phase I Expedition to the wreck site of La Minerve. In March 2020 he was Chief Scientific on the Phase III expedition to the deepest point of the Red Sea (Suakin Trough), where Jamieson and Vescovo successfully explored the Kebrit Brine pool in the submersible.
Notable publications include a paper entitled Bioaccumulation of persistent organic pollutants in the deepest ocean fauna, published in Nature ecology & evolution, Fishes of the hadal zone including new species, in situ observations and depth records of Liparidae, published in 2016 in the journal Deep Sea Research Part I.
Jamieson was part of the team that led to the discovery of microplastics at full ocean depth, and was involved in a recent campaign with the WWF (Call it plastic) to name a hadal species Eurythenes plasticus.
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