Early Online Release | Oceanography
As the profiling float network grows and is sustained, we increas
ingly gain a perspective on how other oceanic regions are respond
ing. These programs have also proven to have phenomenal educa
tion and outreach appeal (Figure 2c,d). Groups can adopt floats,
name them (even personalize their housings), and follow them
over time in conjunction with classroom lesson plans (Adopt-A-
Float program; EARTH Lesson Plans; Matsumoto et al., in press).
To date, people from all 50 US states, Puerto Rico, Samoa, and over
15 countries have adopted floats.
SEEING IS BELIEVING
Advances in biogeochemical measurements have only recently
given us the means to observe the basic vital signs of the global
ocean. Understanding pelagic ecosystem dynamics and the role
that animals play in the marine carbon cycle poses an entirely dif
ferent and arguably far greater challenge. Since the time of the
Challenger Expedition (Thomson, 1887), trawl nets have been
used to search for life in the deep sea with success, but that method
returns no context about the three-dimensional environment in
which animals live, and it destroys fragile animals, thus obscuring
their presence. Diving into the depths to observe life in its natu
ral habitat, up close and in-person, offered an entirely new under
standing compared to what nets yielded.
William Beebe (1934), in his book Half Mile Down, recounted
his personal experiences of being lowered into the sea in a bathy
sphere. He described an abundance of strange deep-sea animals
that frequently glowed in bedazzling ways that defied his expla
nation. One of his team members, Else Bostelmann, a talented
artist, created original works for National Geographic magazine
that reflected Bebee’s accounts and brought deep-sea biology to
the public’s attention (Widder, 2016). Decades later, more sophis
ticated expeditions using self-propelled crewed submersibles,
including single-person vehicles (e.g., Robison 1983; Alldredge
et al., 1984; Widder et al., 1989), opened a new chapter of deep-
water research and exploration.
With MBARI’s founding in the late 1980s, David Packard gave
scientists and engineers a new platform for accessing the deep
sea. His charge was to adapt an ROV dubbed Ventana, originally
designed for use in the offshore oil and gas industry, for use as a
multi-purpose research platform (Figure 3a,b). Prior to that time,
no one had attempted to use an ROV for such purposes. Robison
et al. (2017) offered a unique perspective on the history of initiat
ing and developing a midwater research program using ROVs as
did Haddock et al. (2017). At the time of its introduction to the
ocean science community, Ventana, and its support vessel Point
Lobos, seemed unremarkable compared to storied crewed sub
mersibles such as Alvin and Johnson Sea Link and their much larger
mother ships. But it was soon apparent that ROVs offered tremen
dous capabilities and were highly adaptable. They quickly became
integral to the discovery of new species and revelations of pelagic
ecosystem structure and function, in particular, the prevalence
and importance of gelatinous animals (Haddock, 2004; Robison,
2004). ROV time-series studies also made possible the first-ever
comprehensive description of a deep pelagic food web (Choy et al.,
2017). All of these advancements were fundamentally enabled
by telepresence—underwater video recordings—combined with
FIGURE 2. Biogeochemical sensing data and equipment. (a) Comparison
of ship-based profiles for oxygen, chlorophyll, nitrate, and pH. (b) A global
map shows the distribution of profiling floats provided by the Global Ocean
Biogeochemistry Array (GO-BGC), the Southern Ocean Carbon and Climate
Observations and Modeling (SOCCOM) project, and US partners. (c) School
children learn about profiling float technology by examining a mockup with
transparent housing. (d) MBARI marine educator Jennifer Magnusson is
shown ready to launch a float named Trieste from R/V Thomas G. Thompson
in 2024. The National Academies’ Ocean Studies Board (OSB), overseer for
the annual Revelle Lecture, named and adopted the Trieste float in mem
ory of former OSB member Don Walsh who, with Jacques Piccard, made
the first historic dive to the depths of Challenger Deep in the bathyscaphe
Trieste. Images for (c) and (d) provided by G. Matsumoto and J. Magnusson,
respectively, 2025