Renewal of the MISO Facility: Deep-Sea Imaging and Instrumentation for Oceanographic Research (Renewal of NSF-OCE-0649621)

WHOI建议在OCE-0649621提供的支持之后延长五年，该支持将于2012年3月结束。在MISO设施内运行的WHOI TowCams是目前唯一常规可用的美国拖曳深海数字成像和短期延时成像系统。数字海底摄影对多学科科学的重要性，包括在三个Ridge2000 （R2K）综合研究站点（iss）进行的研究，以及由NSF和其他机构（如USGS， NOAA）的核心MGG和生物海洋学项目支持的一般地质、化学和生物海洋学的重要性，都有很好的记录。更广泛的影响目前提案的主要影响在标准二下，为科学家提供基础设施支持，以使用该船及其共享使用的仪器来支持他们的国家科学基金会资助的海洋学研究项目（这些项目单独接受国家科学基金会相关研究项目的单独审查）。共享使用仪器的维护和操作的支持允许nsf资助的研究人员从任何美国大学或实验室访问工作，校准仪器为他们的研究，降低研究的成本，并扩大潜在的研究人员的基础。所有用户（或适当的资助机构）平等地分享船上基本技术服务的支持，NSF根据船舶在一年内的使用情况支付一部分技术支持费用。

WHOI proposes a five-year renewal that follows support provided under OCE-0649621, which will end in March 2012. The WHOI TowCams, operated within the MISO Facility are currently the only routinely available US systems for towed deep-sea digital imaging and short-term time-lapse imaging. The importance of digital seafloor photography for multidisciplinary science, including research that has been conducted at the three Ridge2000 (R2K) Integrated Study Sites (ISSs), and for general geological, chemical and biological oceanography supported by core MGG and Biological Oceanography programs at NSF and within other agencies (e.g., USGS, NOAA), is well documented.Broader ImpactsThe principal impact of the present proposal is under criterion two, providing infrastructure support for scientists to use the vessel and its shared-use instrumentation in support of their NSF-funded oceanographic research projects (which individually undergo separate review by the relevant research program of NSF). The support of maintenance and operation of shared-use instrumentation allows NSF-funded researchers from any US university or lab access to working, calibrated instruments for their research, reducing the cost of that research, and expanding the base of potential researchers. All users (or the appropriate funding agencies) share support for basic technical services on the vessel equally, with NSF paying a share of technical support costs based on fractional usage of the vessel during the year.