ADVANCEMENT OF MARINE SCIENCES 55 



There was very little incentive for private industry to deveolp such 

 instruments because even if it did so there was only a very limited 

 market, a market perhaps restricted to one or two oceanographic 

 institutions. 



iVIany, if not most, of the research instruments in use today in marine 

 scientific studies were designed and developed by scientists themselves, 

 not with a view to profit or distinction, but in order to facilitate their 

 owTi work. 



Advances in potential uses of middepths and abyssal depths of the 

 ocean for both defense and resource exploitation have intensified the 

 need for new and improved instruments, and a number of private 

 industries are now expending much time, talent, and effort to meet the 

 increasing requirements. 



In October 1960, the Hydrographic Office of the Xavy, and the 

 Office of Naval Research jointly conducted a symposium on oceanog- 

 raphic instrumentation, attended by experts in this field from institu- 

 tions and agencies throughout the United States. 



A program which envisioned 40 new and specialized instruments for 

 oceanographic research was prepared and assignments given to 

 institutions and laboratories to design and develop them. 



A number of contemplated instruments are for biological oceano- 

 graphic research. 



To expedite the program and monitor its progress five panels were 

 set up. Mr. Richard Van Haagen, at that tune Director of the small 

 but efficient Instrumentation Laboratory of the Bureau of Commercial 

 Fisheries, Seattle, Wash., w^as named chairman of the panel on 

 biological instrumentation. Mr. Van Haagen returned to Seattle tO' 

 learn that the Bureau had ordered termination of the Laboratory, the 

 only instrumentation laboratory operated by the Bureau, as of 

 December 31, 1960, and on that date it was closed. 



The Laboratory had acquired a reputation for development of 

 man}^ unique instrmnents for use in research by the Bureau and for 

 the benefit of the fisheries industry, during the 4 years of its existence. 

 At the tune it was discontinued it was engaged in fulffiling contracts 

 wdth the Coast and Geodetic Surve}^ and the Liiiversity of North 

 Carolina for instrumentation development. It had recently com- 

 pleted contracts with the Office of Naval Research which held the 

 Laboratory and its staff in high regard and had anticipated entering 

 into new contracts with the Laboratory. The University of Washing- 

 ton was planning contracts with the Laboratory in connection with 

 the unmanned telemetering buoy being erected on Cobb Seamount in 

 the Pacific b}^ the university under a grant from the National Science 

 Foundation. 



The amendment would authorize funds for continued instrument- 

 development by the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries. In connection 

 with this amendment the Conmiittee on Oceanogi'aphy has transmitted 

 to your committee a recommendation \vith respect to instrument 

 development by agencies participating in a 10-year program of marine 

 research, including the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries. The recom- 

 mendation states: 



Present funds to support the production of new oceano- 

 gi'aphic instruments are inadequate. New requirements for 

 ocean\vide surveys, underwater surveillance systems, oce- 



