Introduction
By Daniel Wagner and Allison Fundis
March 2023 marks the thirteenth year of the partnership
between Oceanography, the Ocean Exploration Trust
(OET), and other organizations to co-develop an annual
supplement to the journal highlighting advancements in
ocean exploration. This issue summarizes work conducted
as part of the 2022 field season aboard OET’s E/V Nautilus.
Since OET first launched expeditions aboard Nautilus in
2009, our work has centered on exploring the ocean and
making discoveries, while pushing the boundaries of
technological innovation, education, and outreach. During
the 2022 field season, Nautilus undertook 11 multidisci-
plinary expeditions to explore some of the most remote
and poorly surveyed areas in the Central Pacific. Several of
these integrated emerging exploration technologies, and
all included efforts to share expedition stories with diverse
audiences across the globe.
As in previous years, E/V Nautilus began its 2022 oper-
ations with a shakedown cruise to complete a series of
engineering tests in preparation for the field season, and
then conducted several expeditions focused on mapping
and remotely operated vehicle operations in US waters
surrounding the Hawaiian Islands and the Pacific Remote
Islands. Two of these expeditions also included deploy-
ments of vehicles from partners of the Ocean Exploration
Cooperative Institute, a consortium of oceanographic
institutions that brings together the expertise and capa-
bilities of the University of Rhode Island, University of
New Hampshire, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution,
University of Southern Mississippi, and OET to advance
the core priorities of NOAA Ocean Exploration. These
technology- focused expeditions demonstrated the value
of combining complementary ocean exploration technolo-
gies, as well as the benefits of inter-institutional collabora-
tions, for accelerating the pace by which we can effectively
explore our ocean. The 2022 Nautilus season ended with
three back-to-back expeditions that combined the com-
plementary missions of OET and the National Geographic
Society to undertake a new shallow-water exploration
program for Nautilus.
Stories and discoveries from the 2022 season were
shared with public audiences via various avenues that col-
lectively reached several million people around the world.
Across the 2022 field season, expedition teams hosted
569 live interactions from the broadcast studio onboard
Nautilus, welcomed aboard over 50 students and educa-
tors, grew the program’s social media presence, developed
dozens of new STEM education resources, and promoted
Nautilus work through more than 1,200 media stories.
The accomplishments of the E/V Nautilus 2022 field sea-
son were only possible thanks to the many partners that
contributed to this work, including both ship-based and
shore-based personnel. In 2022, OET continued to build on
its collaborations with NOAA Ocean Exploration, the Ocean
Exploration Cooperative Institute, the National Geographic
Society, the Office of Naval Research, the National Marine
Sanctuary Foundation, and many others that are detailed
throughout this supplement to Oceanography. These
partnerships focused not only on gaining new knowledge
about our largely unexplored ocean, but also on how to
meaningfully share this knowledge with a wide array of
ocean stakeholders, particularly those from geographies
where Nautilus operated. In particular, we continued our
on going collaboration with our partners in Hawai‘i—
including Papahānamokuākea Marine National Monument
staff and representatives of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs-
facilitated Papahānamokuākea Cultural Working Group—
to ensure our expeditions to places that hold cultural
significance to Native Hawaiians incorporated Hawaiian
worldview, participation, and input.