GIS/Research assistant
> Christopher G. Fox
Chief Scientist of Our Cruise
> Steve Hammond
Marine geophysicist
> Jon Kaye
Microbiologist
> Russell McDuff
Geochemist
> Lauren Mullineaux
Benthic ecologist
> Veronique Robigou
Geologist
> Cindy Lee Van Dover
Biologist and former Pilot
> Dana Yoerger
Head of Navigation
Geophysicist; VENTS Division Leader
Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory, NOAA
Photo courtesy of Stephen Hammond
What are your responsibilities as a geophysicist on our cruise and as the division leader of the PMEL VENTS program?
My role as the Program Manager of the Vents Program is primarily to insure that financial and ship time support are adequate to allow the seagoing scientists to achieve their objectives. A large and complex cruise such as this requires a huge amount of behind-the-scenes work, including administrative and engineering support. After the cruise, since I am also a marine geophysicist, I will participate with my seagoing colleagues in helping to analyze and interpret some of the data. Most likely, I will be involved with helping to integrate some of the cruise's geological results with data from the underwater hydrophone and previous studies of the volcano near where NeMO, the undersea observatory we are building, is being located.
One of the most important technologies that we are working on (and are very close to achieving operational success with) is that of bringing back data from a wider variety of seafloor instrument systems in real-time via global cellular communications networks. One of the major hindrances of working on process which occur so deep in the ocean (let alone in areas subject to active volcanism and hot, corrosive venting) is access to these sites. One cannot understand a major planetary process, which is what volcanism along seafloor spreading centers is, without making long-term, in situ measurements. One cannot, for example, hope to understand how the most common kind of volcanic activity on Earth works and affects the ocean environment, by just going out to sea once a year for a week or two to make measurements. This is why we are in the process of establishing long-term instrumented seafloor observatories like NeMO. Initially, we will get data from the observatories by visiting them periodically using ships, submersibles, and ROVs but the future lies in being able to not only gain access to data in real-time but to even instruct seafloor instruments to conduct specific kinds of operations on command. This is the technology that the NOAA Vents program is investing in. Prototype real-time instrument systems are already being deployed. This is how we will bring back information from NeMO in the very near future. This will be information available to any interested scientist or person through the Internet.
How did you prepare for this job?
Counting my years spent as a graduate student, I have been a marine geologist and geophysist for over 30 years now. I have spent my research career working in a broad variety of scientific disciplines, all of which are applicable to the goal of understanding how geological processes on the deep ocean floor create and move the Earth's crustal plates. For the past 15 years, my efforts have been particularly directed at understanding how some of these processes (mainly seafloor volcanism and hydrothermal activity) impact the ocean's chemical, physical, and biological environments.
"Discovery of the microbial biosphere, which lies beneath the global seafloor spreading center system, is akin to discovering life on another planet or a whole new rainforest ecosystem, in terms of its immense potential for finding microorganisms that may have a very wide variety of biotechnical and pharmaceutical applications."
--- Dr. Stephen R. Hammond
--
<-- Go back to the previous page
--
<-- Go back to the main Meet the Scientists page
--
<-- Go back to the Welcome Aboard! page
| Dive Briefing | Research Tools | Meet the Scientists! | Fauna | Geology |
| Significance | Ethics | Unsolved Mysteries | InterActivities | Forum |
| Glossary | Acknowledgements & Sources |
| E-mail us! |