34 



Oceanography — The Ten Years Ahead 



Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the 

 Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution for a num- 

 ber of years and this work will continue. 



Many agencies are contemplating plans based 

 on the use of anchored buoy stations in rather 

 large networks within the next few years. Before 

 these plans are executed, three important inter- 

 im steps should be taken. First, the development 

 program should be carried to the point where 

 sensors are reliably capable of long unattended 

 operation and the buoy can be counted on to hold 

 its moorings and transmit significant amounts of 

 information over the required distances. No buoys 

 have these characteristics at present and much 

 more expensive development is required. Second, 

 once such buoys are available, none should be in- 

 stalled until the time space data sampling require- 

 ments are thoroughly worked out. These require- 

 ments depend on the scientific question being 

 asked, the process to be studied, and the scale 

 characteristics of other processes also capable of 

 producing sensor responses appearing as "noise" 

 in the data record. The noise must not obscure the 

 signal. Finally, efforts under way at the interna- 

 tional level to establish legal and operational con- 

 ventions must be completed. 



Figure 4 shows the relative effort contributed to 

 the instrumentation program by the various agen- 

 cies. The Navy expects to carry three-fifths of the 

 planned total of $103 million, reflecting a massive 

 effort to expedite solutions of problems of pack- 

 aging sensing-recording-processing systems, to 

 perfect deep diving exploration vehicles, and to 

 overcome sound attenuation. The remaining two- 

 fifths will be fairly evenly divided among the Bu- 

 reau of Commercial Fisheries, Geological Survey, 

 Bureau of Mines, Coast Guard, Weather Bureau, 

 and the Coast and Geodetic Survey. Particular 

 efforts are therefore being made to assure thor- 

 ough exchange of information among the agencies 

 concerned by the establishment of a central file 

 of instrumentation data at the National Oceano- 

 graphic Data Center, the publication of an encyclo- 

 pedia of oceanographic instruments, and the joint 

 agency use of the Navy's Oceanographic Instru- 

 mentation Center at the Navy Yard Annex in 

 Washington, D.C. 



H. Manpower 



A final capability on which all else depends is an 

 adequate corps of trained, imaginative, and skillful 



scientists. No other problem in basic oceanography 

 currently warrants greater attention than the man- 

 power problem, and this in spite of the fact that 

 the ranks of oceanographers are expected to con- 

 tinue to grow at a rate moderately in excess of the 

 national average for scientists as a whole. This 

 projected growth in oceanography of about ten 

 percent where the national increase in all types 

 of scientists has averaged about seven percent is 

 the basis for the programs now planned in pursuit 

 of the national goals in oceanography. Meeting 

 these requirements is expected to result from the 

 continued transfer of scientists from other basic 

 fields such as physics, geology, chemistry, biology, 

 mathematics, and engineering since fewer than 

 100 deg[rees in oceanography are granted each 

 year. The greatest educational shortages are pro- 

 jected to lie in the areas of physical and meteoro- 

 logical oceanography, although systematic biolo- 

 gists, marine geophysicists, and geochemists are 

 also scarce. Other types of marine biologists and 

 geologists are currently being trained at an ade- 

 quate rate. Two attacks on the problem currently 

 being mounted involve motivation at lower aca- 

 demic levels and increased application of training 

 grants. 



In one respect, the large number of transfers 

 from other fields is desirable. It provides a cross- 

 fertilization of ideas which is particularly valuable 

 in oceanography where many of the processes of 

 greatest interest are best dealt with from a multi- 

 disciplinary point of view. As oceanographic fron- 

 tiers are pushed back, more and more specialized 

 knowledge in an increasing variety of technologies 

 and fields of knowledge is required to help solve 

 the novel problems which keep turning up, and to 

 devise new "tactics" to surmount unprecedented 

 difficulties. 



On the other hand, the "strategic" approach to 

 oceanographic knowledge to assure its advance 

 over a broad front can hardly be certain without 

 the creative activity of a large number of people 

 broadly trained and widely experienced in ocea- 

 nography itself. 



In the light of this situation, the direct support 

 provided by the National Science Foundation, and 

 the Departments of Interior and HEW for fellow- 

 ships and training grants in oceanography might 

 seem small, especially since the ten-year projection 

 shows little increase over the period. However, the 

 problem is strongly cyclic and self-limiting. Uni- 



