58 MARINE SCIENCE 



My colleagues on the Committee on Oceanography have already 

 presented testimony concerning the broad objectives of the program 

 envisioned in the report, Oceanograph 1960-70, and many aspects 

 of the recommendations have already been considered in some detail. 

 It is now my privilege, and mj responsibility, to discuss for a few 

 brief moments the vast and significant topic of basic research in ocea- 

 nography. 



Basic research is a subject so broad in its scope and so profound 

 in its implications as to defy a simple or superficial exposition. Yet 

 it is easy to say what it is : Basic research is the unfettered quest for 

 new knowledge; it is the study of questions that are asked out of 

 wonder and puzzlement ; it is investigation motivated only by curiosity 

 and interest; it is the search for understanding without concern for 

 the practical application of the results or economic exploitation of the 

 information obtained. 



All of these statements are true, yet they are also somewhat mis- 

 leading. Many problems of great economic import have been and 

 continue to be studied because they are intrinsically interesting and 

 conversely, unexpected applications constantly arise from research 

 of the "purest," most nonapplied character. 



History is full of illustrative examples in every discipline in 

 science; let me cite one or two from the field of marine biology. 

 For some years I have been interested in marine invertebrates that 

 burrow into various materials in the sea, and we became intrigued 

 by one, a minute crustacean, that not only burrows into wood in sea 

 water but also feeds on the material that it excavates. 



Now, few animals can really eat wood, but this one does. The piles 

 that support a dock or wharf and the wood of floats and boats are just 

 as palatable as driftwood. That the feeding and burrowing of this 

 insignificant creature causes the destruction of waterfront and mari- 

 time structures and consequent monetary losses of a high degree is 

 really incidental to our concern to learn how this animal can digest 

 so insoluble and unpromising a substance as cellulose. But, during 

 the course of our studies, we have learned enough about the creature's 

 activities to suggest some new approaches to the problem of pro- 

 tecting wood from biological deterioration. 



Another illustration of the dynamic interplay between the indul- 

 gence of curiosity and the usefulness of new information — just 

 before the turn of the century, a group of French biologists on a cruise 

 in the Mediterranean wondered what makes a jellyfish sting. Think- 

 ing that some poison was implicated, they ground up jellyfish tenta- 

 cles; small amounts of this material were injected at short intervals 

 of time into experimental animals. The result was the first induced 

 case of anaphylactic shock, and the science of serology was born. 



Many other examples from marine biology could be listed includ- 

 ing studies of the curious vertical migrations of planktonic organ- 

 isms that we now realize may be significant in transporting materials, 

 including radioisotopes, from deeper waters up to shallow areas. 

 The whole question of nutrient cycles in the sea, with all its implica- 

 tions for future exploitation, reaches out into every discipline, requir- 

 ing, for its thorough understanding, information about the behavior 

 and ecology of micro-organisms, the formation of communities and 

 aggregations, about the interplay between species, the movements of 



