A daily compilation of significant news articles and comment
May 23, 2007
3. Watersheds -
UCSD wins grant to launch massive study of the oceans -
Whale worries grow
Rescuers, troubled by their behavior, will try to push pair into saltier water -
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UCSD wins grant to launch massive study of the oceans
By Terry Rodgers, STAFF WRITER
The
The university's efforts are part of a $350 million federal initiative that coordinators describe as the greatest leap in marine science since research vessels began exploring the seas in the 1870s.
Oceanographers, biologists and other experts plan to study the diverse ecosystems of the oceans by installing unmanned observation systems at various depths. Stations on the sea floor will have interactive instruments such as high-resolution cameras and remote-controlled robots that can drill into rocks to collect samples. Data-gathering buoys will be deployed on the surface and in the water column.
This network initially will cover the Pacific and
That means fisheries experts in
“This is the first step in gaining a fundamental understanding of the three-quarters of our planet that we know almost nothing about,” said Steve Bohlen, president of Joint Oceanographic Institutions in Washington, D.C. “It will transform how we understand the whole system – how the earth, land and air all operate together.”
Bohlen's group, a consortium of 31 of the nation's leading oceanographic institutions, was chosen by the National Science Foundation to oversee the project.
Bohlen compared the undertaking, called the Ocean Observatories Initiative, to the global establishment of weather stations that provide continuous information about what's happening to Earth's atmosphere and surface.
Until the high-tech marine network is up and running, oceanographers largely are limited to gathering data during weeks-or months-long expeditions on research ships or during shorter trips using remote-controlled probes and deep-diving submarines.
Marine experts said the initiative eventually will yield findings crucial for everything from temperature readings for climate-change studies to geological readings for earthquake assessments.
“To understand what's going on with global warming and the rest of the planet, we really have to look at the ocean more intensely,” said Deborah Kelly, an oceanographer at the
“I think we will make really profound discoveries – there's no doubt. I can't imagine a more exciting time for oceanography.”
Last week, the consortium awarded the $29 million contract to UCSD to develop a computer infrastructure for operating the whole monitoring network, storing the massive amount of data it will generate and allowing people worldwide to access that information via the Internet.
“(It's) the glue that holds the project together,” said John Orcutt, a lead scientist for the Ocean Observatories Initiative and a professor of geophysics at UCSD's Scripps Institution of Oceanography in
Scripps is working with the university's California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology. They will hire about two dozen computer scientists and electrical engineers to create the high-tech framework during the next six years.
Afterward, UCSD could receive an additional $13 million to fine-tune the system.
The consortium also recently awarded a $2.2 million contract to the
If consortium leaders approve the blueprint, they would disburse $130 million for the same team to build this regional component of the overall initiative. The construction work would include the laying of 850 miles of high-speed, fiber-optic cables on the ocean floor.
Researchers chose the Juan de Fuca fault line, which is 200 miles off the
“The bottom of the ocean and how it behaves over time are virtually unknown,” said John Delaney, a
The final phase of the project involves building and operating a network of satellite-linked buoys that will give the initiative a broader reach.
Consortium leaders expect to announce two contracts for that work in August; one would be for a coastal buoy system and the other would be for its deep-ocean counterpart.
Once all elements of the initiative are functional, it will take about $50 million annually to maintain them.
The project's participants emphasize that oceanographers won't be the only people to benefit from their undertaking. Orcutt, the Scripps professor, envisions all types of scientists tapping into the data and fostering a cross-pollination of research.
For example, scientists collaborating with NASA are interested in microbes that manage to thrive in extreme conditions. These microbes live next to volcanic vents on the sea floor, an environment with no sunlight and water that's hotter than 200 degrees Fahrenheit.
NASA and its partners want to examine the organisms as a guide for exploring other possible life forms in the solar system.
Ultimately, the Ocean Observatories Initiative will bring about an unprecedented “democratization” of marine science, Orcutt said.
“We're welcoming everybody in,” he said. #
http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20070523/news_1n23oceans.html
Whale worries grow
Rescuers, troubled by their behavior, will try to push pair into saltier water
Sacramento
By Matt Weiser and Bobby Caina Calvan - Bee Staff Writers
RIO VISTA -- Rescuers today planned to launch an early-morning effort to push
The whales, dubbed Delta and Dawn, spent Tuesday just upstream of the
Veterinarians on Tuesday began to notice the whales' skin has lost its sheen and become pitted. Their wounds, likely caused by a ship's propeller, have worsened, said Frances Gulland, a veterinarian with the
The mother whale late Tuesday also began to roll in the water from side to side, and to slap her tail on the water surface, a behavior called "tail-lobbing." Both are considered to be signs of stress.
"We need to get them back to salt water," said Steve Edinger, assistant chief of the state Department of Fish and Game.
Scientists have also noticed the whales seem to prefer swimming against an incoming tide. So with a flood tide expected at 4:42 a.m. today, officials planned to position a flotilla of boats upstream of the whales by 6:30 a.m. The boats will be armed with noise-making pipes that will be struck with hammers in an effort to drive the whales 15 miles downstream to
"The whales are in charge, obviously, and we have to be accommodating to what they want to do," said Brian Gorman, a spokesman for the National Marine Fisheries Service. "But we have to seize on any opportunity we have to urge them to get down the river."
On Tuesday, the whales continued to frustrate a small army of humans who tried to help. An armada of boats deployed noise-making pipes across the
It seemed to have no direct effect on the whales' behavior, despite the collective will of hundreds of spectators observing from the water's edge.
"Good lord, they need to make up their minds," Rio Vista resident Linda Solomon said of the whales as she watched the noise-making experiment from
Scientists also were unable to attach a satellite tracking tag to the mother by firing it from a crossbow because strong winds made the water too rough for a clean shot. A tissue sample obtained in the same manner on Monday is being analyzed.
Some observers have begun to see a tragic irony in the whales' plight. While thousands of man-hours and as-yet untold dollars are being spent to return these visitors to the ocean, a local fish species -- the tiny Delta smelt -- hangs on the verge of extinction.
The smelt is a fragile, translucent fingerling that lives for only one year. As a result, it is considered a good indicator of the health of the entire Delta.
Last week, preliminary numbers from an annual spring population count found only 25 juvenile smelt in the entire Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. By comparison, the average over the past seven years at this point in the survey was 353 fish counted.
The cause of that decline remains a mystery. Experts suspect a variety of human causes, from pesticides to invasive species and excessive water exports from the Delta, a water supply for 23 million Californians.
Value judgments are hard to make. Some believe the fate of an entire species should merit an equivalent public response.
"We should let nature take its course with the whales," said Bill Jennings, executive director of the California Sportfishing Protection Alliance, which has sued the state to do more for smelt. "While attention is focused on these temporary visitors to the estuary, the Delta smelt -- the proverbial canary in the mine -- is going extinct and no one's paying attention."
No one knows yet how much the humpback whales' visit will cost federal, state and local governments.
But it is likely to be an expensive response to what may be totally natural whale behavior.#
http://www.sacbee.com/101/story/190581.html
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