Adrift on a boat in the middle of the North Pacific Ocean, the most astounding sight is the utter absence of anything to see. The glassy calm water is undisturbed and gently undulating for miles in every direction. Even if you peer over the edge of the deck into the crystalline blue water, the light of the sun penetrates to a depth of around 600 feet without anything to block its path. There appears to be nothing to see but water here, but looks can be deceiving. It’s the impossibly small organisms and their disproportionately large impact on the ecosystem who lured me and a team of scientists to brave the high seas, a curious shark, and an impending hurricane. We came to the middle of the ocean to tap into the secret lives of the microbes that call the open ocean home. We recently published our results in The ISME Journal.