tional Decade of Ocean Exploration (IDOE) J The 



Commission noted that: 



Marine Science has become "big science," and 

 our efforts are limited by inadequate technolo- 

 gy. The Nation is poorly organized to marshal 

 the arrays of multiple ships, buoys, submersi- 

 bles, special platforms, and aircraft, as well as 

 the complex undersea facilities required for 

 important oceanic investigations and experi- 

 ments of a basic character. 



And it recommended accordingly: 



. . .that a small group of institutions, including 

 the present leaders in ocean research, be desig- 

 nated by the Federal Government as Universi- 

 ty-National Laboratories and be equipped to 

 undertake major marine science tasks of a glob- 

 al or regional nature. The laboratories should 

 be distributed geographically for the adequate 

 coverage of all parts of the oceans and would 

 be expected to commit their facilities to serve 

 the needs of scientists affiliated with other insti- 

 tutions. 



Although it may have seemed tempting to es- 

 tablish a whole new set of regional laboratories, 

 NSF decided instead to consolidate its support 

 and management of oceangoing facilities within 

 the new Office for Oceanographic Facilities and 

 Support (OFS) and to encourage the formation of 

 the University-National Oceanographic Laborato- 

 ry System (UNOLS) in the academic community, 

 thus promoting the coordinated use of existing 

 facilities. The development of IDOE not only 

 doubled NSF's investment in ocean science re- 

 search, but also added a new dimension in size 

 and complexity to basic research in oceanogra- 

 phy. Together with the new OFS/UNOLS man- 

 agement structure, IDOE helped achieve the criti- 

 cal mass of facilities, equipment, manpower, and 

 funding which the Commission had correctly iden- 

 tified as essential to a new era of ocean studies. 



Through the cooperative mechanism of 

 UNOLS, the fleet of ships operated by the aca- 

 demic institutions became a functioning unit 

 sometimes known as the "academic fleet." An 

 executive office for UNOLS, supported jointly by 

 NSF, ONR, and other Federal agencies, was cre- 

 ated to give the enterprise appropriate manage- 

 ment, including a single point of access to ship 

 users from nonoperator institutions. This office 

 also insured that a post hoc record of annual utili- 

 zation of the fleet would be available which would 



'Letter from the Vice President (as Chairman of the Nation- 

 al Council on Marine Resources and Engineering Develop- 

 ment) to William D. McElroy, Director, NSF, November 7. 

 I%9. 



permit an evaluation of planning efficiency and 

 efforts to economize. Special facilities such as the 

 submersible DSRV/Alvin have been identified as 

 UNOLS national oceanographic facilities, and 

 their use is reviewed by UNOLS committees. 



The Navy operates several oceanographic ships 

 for its own programs, as does NOAA. The pro- 

 grams and operations of these ships are made 

 available to scientists from other institutions as 

 scheduling allows. Because many Navy oceano- 

 graphic projects in universities utilize the univer- 

 sity oceanographic fleet, ONR contributes to the 

 cost of their operations. 



In conjunction with UNOLS and ONR, NSF 

 conducts an assessment of the material condition 

 of the fleet, using the information to plan neces- 

 sary support for upgrading the ships and to do 

 long-range planning for fleet replacements. 



By improving the management practices of 

 these facilities, NSF and UNOLS have achieved 

 a cost-effective and scientifically productive alter- 

 native to the development of national oceano- 

 graphic laboratories proposed by the Commission 

 nearly a decade ago. 



Relative Merits of Contracts and 

 Grants for Support of Basic Research 



The two legal instruments used for extramural 

 support of basic research are the contract and the 

 grant. The procurement contract requires that 

 both the agency and recipient follow the Govern- 

 ment procurement procedures and regulations 

 required by legislation and administrative order. 

 Generally, the grant has been accepted as a sim- 

 ple way to make funds available while placing the 

 responsibility for performance on the recipient. 



These two award procedures at first represented 

 "extremes," but because both have been modified 

 over the years, they have become more and more 

 alike. While it is often assumed that the grant is 

 the simpler, less involved, and more appropriate 

 instrument by which to award funds for the sup- 

 port of basic research, in many cases it has been 

 made more restrictive by additional requirements. 

 Conversely, a research contract for the "pur- 

 chase" of research has, in some cases, been sim- 

 plified, so thai it has become easier to carry out 

 basic research under the contract procedure than 

 through grants (e.g., ONR). 



The simple basic research grant has acquired 

 more involved management procedures because 

 agencies have felt it necessary to retain much of 

 the decisionmaking authority in order to meet 

 congressional and administrative concerns for 

 accountability. Requirements related to procure- 



AGENCY SUPPORT OF BASIC RESEARCH BY FIELD OF SCIENCE 275 



