Oceanography 1951 



deep ocean floor showing the tracks of 

 numerous animals. Because organisms exist 

 throughout the ocean, and not merely 

 at its surface and bottom, it has many 

 times the living space of the continents. 



The end of all life is death and decay. 

 Paradoxically, decay is itself brought about 

 by microbial life, which converts the frag- 

 ments of earlier life into chemical nutrients 

 that can be utilized again in the growth 

 of plants. On land, decay occurs in the 

 surface layers of the soil, where roots of 

 plants absorb the chemicals that are later 

 utilized upon exposure to light in the leaves. 

 In the ocean, the dead organisms drop, per- 

 haps several miles, through the water; at 

 all depths they are attacked by processes of 

 decay, and finally the remains reach the 

 ocean floor. In some areas there is so little 

 free oxygen on the bottom that the bacteria 

 familiar to the agriculturalist cannot live; 

 yet the mud stinks from the action of aner- 

 obic bacteria. The nutrients thus produced 

 in deep water must be transported upward 

 again, and perhaps horizontally for thou- 

 sands of miles, before they reach the illu- 

 minated layers of the sea where plants can 

 grow through photosynthesis. Conse- 

 quently, the entire gigantic heat engine of 

 the ocean must work in order that the 

 smallest of its floating plants may grow. 



Such interrelations as those just outlined 

 between the sciences of the sea give them a 

 unity which justifies the use of the single 

 term oceanography to embrace them all. 

 The basic problems mentioned above do not 

 exhaust the list of studies of the ocean that 

 can and should be made. The economic 

 and social problems of the sea have great 

 practical importance. 



The sea is a source of food, but com- 

 pared to modern agriculture the fisheries 

 of the world remain undeveloped. In its 

 broadest terms, the problem is to obtain 

 a maximum yield of food from each acre of 

 sea surface. No reliable estimates can yet 

 be made, but the yield is certainly much 

 greater than that now being obtained. 



The practical importance of submarine 

 geology is just beginning to be realized. Oil 

 occurs almost exclusively in marine sedi- 



ments, and many other commercial minerals 

 have a marine origin. The study of very 

 recent marine sediments supplies much in- 

 formation about the conditions under which 

 such deposits were formed, and is proving 

 an increasingly useful guide in their dis- 

 covery. 



The oceans carry a large traffic of ships. 

 The rapid development of airlines may 

 possibly challenge their importance for pas- 

 senger travel, but it is certain that the great 

 volume of transoceanic freight will continue 

 to be waterborne. Increased knowledge of 

 the sea can help in many ways to speed 

 this traffic, to make it safer and more eco- 

 nomical. Likewise the military importance 

 of ocean transport in time of war, and its 

 vulnerability to attack by submarine, also 

 present problems for the oceanographer to 

 study. 



The United States has accepted world- 

 wide responsibilities in social, economic and 

 political matters. To meet these, it must 

 look beyond its own borders. The ocean is 

 no longer a barrier but rather a medium 

 that connects this continent with all other 

 lands. It is an important source of food, 

 actual and potential, for the whole world. 

 Any expansion of the fishing industry will 

 take it farther out to sea, and bring inter- 

 national problems with it. Consequently 

 one part of the new responsibility of the 

 United States is the active investigation of 

 the oceans on a scale comparable to that 

 of previous study of the resources within 

 our continental boundaries. 



It is the purpose of this report to review 

 briefly the resources in facilities, personnel, 

 and income available in this country for 

 the support of oceanographic research, and 

 to discuss some of the difficulties which 

 must be overcome if our knowledge of the 

 ocean is to be advanced for the benefit of 

 mankind. Because of increasing speciali- 

 zation in oceanography, the comprehensive 

 teaching of the subject at a university will 

 require the organization of a small depart- 

 ment. The demand for trained people will 

 probably remain small, so that few uni- 

 versities will be willing to maintain an ade- 

 quate department of oceanography. More- 



