Enabling Powerful New Scientific Approaches
When completed in 2014, the Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI) will encompass an integrated, global network of ocean sensors providing near-real time data that will transform the study of interrelated ocean processes on coastal, regional, and global spatial scales.
The OOI is an outgrowth of scientific planning efforts by both national and international ocean research communities over the past two decades and is motivated in part by the rapidly expanding development of computational, robotic, communications, and sensor capabilities.
OOI Will Provide:
- Integrated observing arrays offering a sustained presence in the coastal ocean, ocean basins, and on the seafloor;
- A central cyberinfrastructure managing a diverse, high-volume data stream;
- Temporal and spatial scales of data resolution ranging from seconds to decades and millimeters to kilometers;
- The capability to alter sampling frequency to capture transient events such as ocean fronts, eddies, storms, eruptions, earthquakes, and harmful algal blooms;
- High frequency, long time-series sampling by advanced suites of sensors;
- Unprecedented power and rapid, two-way data transfer;
- Continuous data feeds that can be used in global models;
- The capability to conduct controlled experiments using instruments that can track unexpected changes and accept commands from shore;
- The capability to support new sensors for biological and chemical research;
- Powerful instrument testbeds to support the next wave of innovation.
