Hardly anything is none of my business.
That is why I went into Geography.
Geography is to life as the stage is to the play.
I've live my life that way, studying life as a Geographer and have never really worked as a "Geographer".
How Low Can You Go
How do Sperm Whales dive miles into the ocean depths to feed on squid and then return to the surface, all on one breath and in 90 minutes.
All of those problems have been answered except one. How do they surface?
How do they get the spermaceti to expand to provide buoyancy when they at the bottom of the ocean and it is a cold hard wax?
At first it was thought that the cold wax version of spermaceti was warmed up by its blood and as it warmed up it expanded and brought the whale to the surface like a balloon. But there is not enough heat exchange for the blood to do that.
"The spermaceti organs may also help adjust the whale's buoyancy. It is hypothesized that before the whale dives, cold water enters the organ, and it is likely that the blood vessels constrict, reducing blood flow, and, hence, temperature. The wax therefore solidifies and reduces in volume.[34][44] The increase in specific density generates a down force of about 392 newtons (860 lb) and allows the whale to dive with less effort. During the hunt, oxygen consumption, together with blood vessel dilation, produces heat and melts the spermaceti, increasing its buoyancy and enabling easy surfacing.[57] However, more recent work[47] have found many problems with this theory including the lack of anatomical structures for the actual heat exchange.[58]"
How does the stuff heat up and expand? Sound. That's my hypothesis. The whales organ containing the wax/oil is direct connect to the right nostril which is used to make sound via phonic, aka monkey, lips. Subsonic sound vibrations would heat and expand the wax to oil and up comes the whale. Problem, well one is that all that biological mechanism has been claimed as imperative territory by the whale talk/sonar imaging biologist. So that alone puts a "do not trespass" sign on the whole organ. I communicated directly with some Sperm Whale experts. They were kind, but told me that this was outside their expertise and try so and so. So I'm probably full of bullshit.
I just want to post this here in never blog neverland, maybe to give someone an idea to pursue. If nothing else, it was an interesting thought exercise.
