305 



House chiel-ol-siarO. have also shared 

 a vision of Monterey Bay and the 

 central coast. Farr saw the potential 

 for the bay to become a center for 

 marine sciences years ago and has 

 worked relentlessly to bring together 

 those involved with the bay to focus 

 their energies and deal with regional 

 issues and problems. He initiated 

 regular meetings of the directors of 

 the marine institutions surrounding 

 the bay to encourage collaborative 

 research and cooperative programs 

 that would create a whole bigger than 

 the sum of its parts. 

 And it's v/orking. 



Converting Floods of Data 



Two years ago, the Office of Naval 

 Ressarch funded a five-year $4.5 mil- 

 lion joint research project between 

 computer engineers at UC/ Santa Cruz 

 and scientists at MBARI, the Naval 

 Postgraduate School, and National 

 Oceanic & Atmospheric Administra- 

 tion (NOAA). The focus of the grant 

 is to convert the fiood of data obtained 

 from ships, satellites, and monitoring 

 instruments on winds, waves, tempera- 

 tures, and ocean currents to pictures 

 of marineand weather phenomena in 

 the Monterey Bayarea using computer 

 graphics. Through this effort in com- 

 puter visualization, these scientists 

 and engineers hope to better under- 

 stand how the ocean and atmosphere 

 along the central coast interact to 

 produce our varied weather conditions. 



There are now 18 marine labora- 

 tories or agency facilities either located 

 on the margins of Monterey Bay or in 

 the process of relocating here. These 

 programs, employing more than 1,600 

 scientists, graduate students, and sup- 

 pon staff, have an annual budget in 

 excess of S 1 10 million. Some of these, 

 like the Monterey Bay Aquarium 

 and Long Marine Laboratory of LJC/ 

 Santa Cruz are well known and visited 

 by the public daily. Others, such as 

 the Naval Research Laboratory(NRL) 

 or the Fleet Numerical Meteorology 

 & Oceanography Center (FNMOC) 

 are important national facilities in- 

 volved in global research and monitor- 

 ing programs but not well known by 

 the general public. Collectively, these 

 laboratories and research centers con- 

 stitute perhaps the highest concentra- 

 tion of marine scientists per mile of 

 shoreline of any place in the world. 

 Additional research groups have ex- 

 pressed interest in relocating here. 



Monterey Bay's characteristics stem 



of oceanic circulation and the dramatic 

 contours of its seafloor, including 

 one of the world's largest submarine 

 canyons. Straddling subtropical and 

 temperate climatic zones, Monterey 

 Bay experiences great variation arising 

 from changes in winds and adjacent 

 ocean currents. 



From Febrtiary to September, north- 

 west winds combined with the Coriolis 

 effect push coastal surface waters 

 offshore and nutrient-laden deep water 

 flows to the surface on an episodic 

 basis. After winds die down in the 

 fall, upwellingdecreasesand biological 

 productivity declines. In winter, the 

 nonh-flowing Davidson Current pro- 

 vides a partial warming influence and 

 significant upweiling doesn't begin 

 anew until February when the winds 

 shift again. 



The intense biological productivity 

 from seasonal upweiling is combined 

 with the intersection of subtropical 

 and temperate conditions to produce 

 an ecosystem that is more complex 

 than either condition alone. This 

 combination of factors produces one 

 of the richest marine faunas and flo- 

 ras in the world. 



The West Coast of North America 

 is famous for its diverse marine flora, 

 and 80 percent of the seaweed occurr- 

 ing between Puget Sound and South- 

 ern California can be found in the 

 vicinity of Monterey Bay. The diverse 

 habitats include the mudflats of Elk- 

 horn Slough, the kelp forests of the 

 Monterey Peninsula, the depths of 

 Monterey Canyon with its cold seeps, 

 the invenebrate-rich intertidal reefs 

 at both ends of the bay, and the clean 

 sand bay beaches. These habitats 

 support countless invertebrates, a di- 

 verse group of marine mamma's (26 

 species — the greatest species diversity 

 of marine mammals of any area in 

 the northern hemisphere), and 94 

 species of seabirds. 



As the research and education value 

 of Monterey Bay and the surrounding 

 waters have become more apparent, 

 the threats and impacts of human 

 activity have also been recognized. 



In October 1992, recognition of 

 this unique stretch of coastline was 

 achieved when the Monterey Bay 

 National Marine Sanctuary was dedi- 

 cated. The nation's largest and the 

 world's second largest sanctuary en- 

 compasses 5,300 square miles of 

 coastal water and seafloor. This desig- 

 nation provides permanent protection 

 for one-fourth of the entire Cali- 



luiiiia coast and also preserves the 

 natural resources for generations to 

 come. 



The marine laboratories and state 

 and federal agency programs located 

 on the bay margins or planning to 

 relocate here focus their research on 

 a wide range of research topics impor- 

 tant both to the residents of the 

 communities around Monterey Bay 

 and to the nation and world. A sum- 

 mary of these programs was pre- 

 pared in June 1 992 by NOAA's Office 

 of Strategic Planning ( The Monterey 

 Bay Connection: A Prospectus for 

 Scientific Excellence in the i990s) in 

 response to a request by Dr. John 

 Knauss, then undersecretary of com- 

 merce for oceans & atmosphere, and 

 forms the basis for the following 

 summary. 

 Marine Science Agencies, Programs 



The Institute of Marine Sciences, 

 UC/ Santa Cruz, an organized research 

 unit within the university with 25 

 affiliated faculty members from five 

 academic departments as well as 20 

 to 25 researchers, focuses on marine 

 mammals, aquatic toxicology, conti- 

 nental margin tectonic.";, coastal haz- 

 ards, ocean processes, :.nd paleocea- 

 nography. Total staff including grad- 

 uate students numbers 1 86. The annual 

 budget is about $7.5 million. Besides 

 a new, on-campus Earth and Marine 

 Sciences building, it operates the 

 Long Marine Laboratory on the north- 

 em edge of Monterey Bay. Long 

 Marine Lab supports research in 

 marine vertebrate biology, environ- 

 mental toxicology, and near-shore 

 ecology/ invertebrate marine biology 

 / molecular marine biology plus a pub- 

 lic education program. On-campus 

 efforts include marine geology and 

 geophysics, ocean processes and pale- 

 oceanography, and coa.ual processes 

 and hazards research. 



The Branch of Pacific Marine Geo- 

 logy (BPMG.l (to be co-located at the 

 Long Marine Laboratory by mid- 

 1997) is the branch of the U.S. Geolog- 

 ical Survey that conducts marine 

 geological, geophysical, and geochem- 

 ical studies of seafloor regions in the 

 Pacific and Arctic basins and their 

 margins (western United States, Alas- 

 ka, Hawaii, and the Trust Territories) 

 under the auspices of the Marineand 

 Coastal Geology Program. The pro- 

 gram is focused on environmental 

 quality and preser\'ation, geologic 

 hazards, seafioor resources, and public 

 information. The USGS marine pro- 

 gram is currently expanding its capa- 



