Oceanography Seminar - John Smith

March 8, 3:00pm - 4:15pm
Mānoa Campus, Marine Sciences Building 100

Recent collaborative seamount studies in the Johnston Atoll monument unit with Falkor, Okeanos Explorer and SOEST

Preliminary results from multidisciplinary studies carried out in the recently expanded Johnston Atoll Unit (JAU) of the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument (PRIMNM) over the past four years will be presented.

The R/V Kilo Moana, Schmidt Ocean Institute’s R/V Falkor and the NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer/ROV Deep Discoverer tandem, along with science teams from 51²è¹Ý/SOEST and other institutions, were involved in a series of six cruises to map, explore, and sample the deep-sea geology and biology of the seamounts, guyots, and ridge structures in this region.

Being located within the Prime (Polymetallic) Crust Zone, or PCZ, these thickly encrusted features were also of interest to the NOAA sponsored Campaign to Address Pacific monument Science and Technology NEeds (CAPSTONE) program as a natural laboratory and an analog to unprotected sites that may one day be affected by marine mining.

In addition to the science at hand, extensive public outreach and engagement programs were accomplished including live telepresence, website updates and products, plus an artist-at-sea’s comic rendition for one of the voyages, illustrating scenes during the cruise as was done in the sailing days of yore.


Event Sponsor
Oceanography, Mānoa Campus

More Information
Christopher Sabine, (808) 956-6344, csabine@hawaii.edu, 3/8/18 John Smith (PDF)

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