Oceanographic Instrumentation

University Of California-San Diego Scripps Inst Of Oceanography, La Jolla CA

Investigators

Abstract

A request is made to fund additional and back-up instrumentation on the R/V Roger Revelle, a 273? general purpose Global vessel; the R/V Melville, a 279?general purpose Global vessel; the R/V New Horizon, a 170?, general purpose, Ocean/Intermediate vessel and the R/V Sproul, a 125? general purpose Coastal/Local vessel. All four vessels are operated by Scripps Institution of Oceanography as part of the University-National Oceanographic Laboratory System research fleet. Both R/V Roger Revelle and R/V Melville are Global vessels and support multidisciplinary oceanographic research in all of the world?s ocean basins. R/V New Horizon focuses primarily on offshore California but has been used for work throughout the Pacific. The primary working area for R/V Sproul has been the continental shelf and coastal environments off Southern California. In 2012, R/V Roger Revelle is scheduled for 281 days with NSF days accounting for 64% of the total sailing schedule; R/V Melville is scheduled for 281 days with NSF days accounting for 60% of the total sailing schedule; R/V New Horizon is scheduled for 131 days with NSF days accounting for 60% of the total sailing schedule; and R/V Sproul is scheduled for 91 days with NSF days accounting for 35% of the total sailing schedule Oceanographic instrumentation requested in this proposal includes: 1) Disk Storage Servers $36,215 2) TrackLink 5000 USBL $64,564 3) Air Winches $111,285 4) EIVA Geophysical Software $50,222 5) SeaSoar Block $16,897 6) SeaSoar Hydraulic Unit $59,574 7) 10m2 MOCNESS Components $46,217 TOTAL $384,974 Broader Impacts: The principal impact of the present proposal is under criterion two, providing infrastructure support for scientists to use the vessel and its shared-use instrumentation in support of their NSF-funded oceanographic research projects (which individually undergo separate review by the relevant research program of NSF). The acquisition, maintenance and operation of shared-use instrumentation allows NSF-funded researchers from any US university or lab access to working, calibrated instruments for their research, reducing the cost of that research, and expanding the base of potential researchers.