Introduction to Oceanography
MBARI
Moss Landing
Scripps
San Diego
Oceanography
The Science or Study of the Oceans
• Geological Oceanography
• Physical Oceanography
• Chemical Oceanography
• Biological Oceanography
Geological Oceanography
• Study of earth at edge of ocean
• Formation processes (seafloor)
• Sediments
• Rocks & minerals
• Geothermal vents
Physical Oceanography
• How & why oceans move
• Weather
• Heat transfer
• Water cycles
• Waves, tides, currents
• Temperature
Chemical Oceanography
• Composition & history of
seawater
• Seawater processes &
interactions
• Salinity
• Dissolved gases
• Nutrients
Biological Oceanography
• Living organisms
• Organisms relationships with
each other and their environment
Marine Sediments (geological)
created by
Living Organisms (biological)
That are influenced by
Nutrients (chemical)
and
Currents & Temperature (physical)
History of Oceanography
Early Times
• Paleolithic and Neolithic periods
– Hunting and food gathering:
– Ohlone Indians on Central Coast of California
• The Egyptians
– Offshore fishing
– Exploration- reed boats
• The Phoenicians
– Trade
– Navy
Early Explorers and Traders
• Ancient Civilizations (1500 BC – 500 AD)
• Interest in oceans driven by need to food and
trading
• Egyptians - shipbuilding and coastal piloting
• Phoenicians – North Africa, excellent sailors;
explored the Mediterranean, traded with Britain,
• May have circumnavigated Africa around 600 BC
• Arabs explored the Indian Ocean
• Polynesians – explored Pacific Ocean
From the ninth to sixth centuries B.C. they dominated the Mediterranean Sea, establishing
emporiums and colonies from Cyprus in the east to the Aegean Sea, Italy, North Africa, and
Spain in the west.
Pharos Lighthouse at Alexandria
One of seven wonders of the ancient world
Recently found by marine archeologists
Ancient Classical Knowledge
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Greeks: an intellectual curiosity about the oceans
Aristotle (~350 BC)
Treatise on marine organisms,
observations of water cycle (hydrologic cycle)
Library of Alexandria founded in 3rd century BC.
housed “world’s knowledge”
Eratosthenes (~ 200 BC):
• 2nd librarian at Alexandria
• Calculated earth’s circumference
• Invented latitude and longitude lines
Eratosthenes
Fresco from the Palace of King Minos 1500BC
Possible origin of “Atlantis” as volcanic eruption and
tsunamis destroyed Minoan civilization near Crete
The Polynesians: Explorers of the
Pacific Ocean
Polynesian Double-Hulled Canoe
Dual hulled boats
carried 100 people
Skilled navigation
􀂃 wave action
􀂃 bird flight
􀂃 stars
􀂃 atmospheric
conditions
Polynesian
double hull
canoe
Polynesian Sailing Canoes
Polynesian Stick Map
Migration routes of the Polynesians
Goal: Water Person Hawaiian Style
Hawaiians invented surfing
Easter Island: deforested
Civilization collapses
Middle (Dark) Ages
400s – 1400s in
Europe
Extreme superstition
Fear of intellectual
inquiry
Much information
lost
Map of Europe 600 AD
The Middle Ages
• Vikings
– Improvements in shipbuilding
– Trade and colonization
• Arabs
– Description of currents associated with seasonal monsoon
– Trade routes to China
– Preserved Greek and Roman knowledge
• China
– Compass
– Trade routes to Persian Gulf
• Europe
– Increased knowledge of navigation
– Tide tables
• In 1405, Chinese sent
62 ships to explore the
Indian and Pacific
Oceans
Vikings Age of Exploration 800-1066 AD
Leif Erickson
Discovered North America 500 years
before Columbus
Viking Long Boat
Fig. 1.5
Modern day Vikings
Vikings where did they go?
Vikings view of their Inuit Neighbors
Ptolemy’s Map of the World
150AD
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Fig. 1.4
Ptolemy’s Map
Still in use 1500 AD
Age of Exploration 1480-1610
Voyages of Discovery
• Early Chinese
– Exploration of the Pacific and Indian Oceans
• Europe
– Prince Henry the Navigator
• Naval observatory
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Vasco da Gama
Christopher Columbus
Ferdinand Magellan
Sir Martin Frobisher
Francis Drake
Fifteenth century routes of Bartholomew Diaz,
Vasco da Gama, and Christopher Columbus
Columbus: Hero or ?
“Gold is most excellent; gold constitutes treasure; and he who has it does all
he wants in the world, and can even lift souls up to Paradise.”
– Christopher Columbus, 1503 letter to the king and queen of Spain.
Navigational Chart of northern Europe
from Johannes van Keulen’s Sea Atlas of
1682-1684
Sixteenth Century circumnavigation
routes of Ferdinand Magellan and Sir
Francis Drake
Sir Francis Drake
Great Explorer or Sea Devil?
The Importance of Charts and
Navigational Information
• Trade, travel, and exploration
• First hydrographic offices
– France, 1720
– Britain, 1795
• Relationship between time and
longitude
– John Harrison; first chronometer
The Importance of Charts and
Navigational Information
• Voyages of James Cook
• Benjamin Franklin
– Chart of Gulf Stream
• National and commercial interests
– U.S. Survey of the Coast set up in
1830 (now known as the U.S. Naval
Oceanographic Office)
James Cook (1728 – 1779)
3 major voyages mapped South
Pacific, coasts of New Zealand,
Australia and N America,
“discovered” Hawaiian Islands
Cook’s Voyages
Ben Franklin’s Gulf Stream Map
Why did Benjamin Franklin make
his map?
• First Postmaster General of U.S., he
wanted to speed the mails across the
Atlantic.
“Dost thou love life?
Then do not squander time,
for that's the stuff life is made of.”
“You may delay but time will not.”
Franklin’s map and satellite photo of
Gulf Stream
“You may delay but time will not.”
Benjamin Franklin
1860 Gulf Stream Map
1860 Gulf Stream Map
What’s at the bottom of the Sea?
Ocean Science Begins
• Botanists and naturalists
– Collect, describe, and classify organisms
– Theory of atoll formation (Charles Darwin)
– Investigations of microscopic drifting plants
and animals (plankton)
• Scientific interest based on practical
reasons
– Navigation, tide prediction, and safety
• Importance of government support
– Laying of transatlantic telegraph cables
H.M.S. Beagle 1831-1836
Voyage of the Beagle, 1831-1836
First “true” oceanographer
1847 Maury
1847: U.S. Navy Lieutenant Matthew F. Maury
produced first bathymetric, wind and current chart
of the North Atlantic.
The Challenger Expedition
• Comprehensive scientific expedition
• Naval corvette refitted with laboratories,
winches, and sounding scope
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Circumnavigation
361 sounding stations
Collected deep-sea water samples
Investigated deep-water motion
Temperature measurements at all depths
Thousands of biological and sea-bottom samples
Challenger
Fig.
1.15 Expedition
• Analysis and compilation of data continued for
20 years
• Began oceanography as a modern science
• Prestige stimulated expeditions by other
nations
Voyage of the Challenger, 1872-1876
Challenger Expedition
Exploratory Science
• Fridtjof Nansen
– Voyage of the Fram
– Nansen bottle
• International
scientific cooperation
– Motivated by
fluctuations in
commercial fish
• Antarctic exploration
• Amundsen, Scott,
Shackleton
• Arctic exploration
• Admiral Peary,
Nansen
Early Oceanographers
Harsh conditions and slow work compared to today
Oceanography in the Twentieth
Century
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Support by wealthy individuals
Scripps Institution of Oceanography
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
Rapid advances during World War II
Office of Naval Research (ONR) and National
Science Foundation (NSF) funding
International Geophysical Year (IGY)
cooperation
Satellites
Deep Sea Drilling Program
National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA)
Bathyscaphe Trieste
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http://www.pbs.org/wnet/savageseas/multime
dia/trieste.html
False color images of plankton
concentrations on Tasmania, Australia
Yellow and red: high concentrations
Green and blue: low concentrations
Dark blue and purple: very low concentrations
Glomar Challenger
Deep Sea Drilling Project Ship
(1968 to 1983)
Howard Hughes’ ship
JOIDES Resolution
(1985 to present)
Ocean Drilling Program drill ship
Offshore Drilling Platform
MBARI
Moss Landing
Scripps
San Diego
Most famous oceanographer today:
Robert Ballard
Play movie
Found Titanic, Lusitania, Bismarck, PT 109, Black Sea Flood
Marcia McNutt, MBARI
Jacques Cousteau
(1910-1997)
invented SCUBA during
World War II
Jacques Cousteau
(1910-1997)
Most famous oceanographer of the
20th century
• If we go on the way we
have, the fault is our
greed... if we are not
willing [to change],
we will disappear from
the face of the globe,
to be replaced by the
insect.
~ Jacques Cousteau
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Doc Ricketts
The Recent Past, the Present,
and the Future of Oceanography
• Earth is a complex of systems and
subsystems
• Cross disciplinary research
• Integrated approach
• Large scale oceanographic programs
– Climate: WOCE, JGOFS, GOALS,
– Structure and history of the Earth: ODP,
RIDGE
– Satellites; TOPEX/Poseidon, Jason-1
– Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS)
– Project NEPTUNE
The future? ROVs and satellites
This image of the Pacific Ocean was produced using sea-surface height measurements taken by the U.S.-French Jason
satellite. The image is based on the average of 10 days of data centered on Feb. 12, 2007, compared to the long-term average
of observations from 1993 through 2005. In this image, places where the Pacific sea surface height is higher (warmer) than
normal are yellow and red, and places where the sea surface is lower (cooler) than normal are blue and purple. Green shows
where conditions are near normal. Sea-surface height is an indicator of the heat content of the upper ocean.
ROV has an unexpected visitor,
a Sperm Whale
Nuclear Missile Submarine
Naval Postgraduate School
Monterey, California
Our little Blue Marble
Summary
Summary
• Oceanography, a multidisciplinary field
– Geology, geophysics, chemistry, physics,
meteorology, biology
• Early explorers and traders
• National and commercial interests
• Beginning of ocean science (19th
century)
• 20th century
– Role of private institutions
– Role of large-scale government funding and
international cooperation
Sunset