Marine Geological Samples Laboratory: Graduate School of Oceanography, University of Rhode Island(support of marine sample curation)

海底岩石、岩心、珊瑚、热液喷口流体和烟囱沉积物、沉积物和其他材料的样本是宝贵的科学资源，是在科学海洋考察中花费巨大费用收集的。有些样品来自异常短暂的浅海近岸环境，另一些样品来自大洋中脊、海山、深海平原、火山岛的根部和大陆架。许多样品来自海面以下数英里的人迹罕至的地方，并由专门的机器人车辆、人工潜水器、取芯设备和/或岩石挖掘机从海底取回。为了保存这些有价值的样本，并将它们提供给其他科学家进行原始收集者没有想到的研究，美国国家科学基金会海洋科学部海洋地质和地球物理项目资助了四个专业运营的储存库，其中存放着海洋科学家收集的样本。该奖项资助罗德岛大学海洋地质样品实验室对海洋海底样品的管理、储存和分发。应科学家和教育工作者的要求，样品被分发给希望更好地了解海洋盆地、其资源分布和地球运行方式的科学家和教育工作者。在过去的三年里，这个储存库向美国和国际科学家分发了超过8000个海底材料样本，以促进我们对海底、洋壳、地幔、海底火山活动以及海洋化学史和地球气候的了解。来自储存库的样品已被用于开创新的分析技术，并提供了对海底、大陆边缘和海底岩浆过程的重要见解。这一奖项增加了罗德岛大学的一项重大投资，支持增加一名研究生的形式，专门与其他储存库工作人员合作，维护收集的样本，收集和验证提交的样本信息，并将这些数据和元数据输入在线数据库，使感兴趣的各方可以通过互联网查看收集的样本，以便科学家和教育工作者可以找到并请求用于研究和教育的样本。这项工作的更广泛影响包括研究生水平的课程参与和通过为中小学团体、当地社区组织和其他感兴趣的各方进行旅行而进行的公众宣传。该奖项还为海洋地质基础设施的一个重要部分提供支持，并为一个没有获得大量联邦资金的州(即EPSCoR州)的机构提供支持。

Samples of seafloor rocks, cores, corals, hydrothermal vent fluids and chimney deposits, sediments, other materials are valuable scientific resources that are collected at great expense on scientific oceanographic expeditions. Some samples come from shallow, near-shore environments of unusual and ephemeral character and others come from mid-ocean ridges, seamounts, the abyssal plain, the roots of volcanic islands, and continental shelves. Many samples come from inaccessible places miles below the surface of the ocean and are retrieved from the seafloor by specialized robotic vehicles, human occupied submersibles, coring devices, and/or rock dredges. To preserve these valuable samples and make them available to other scientists for studies not envisioned by the original collectors, the Marine Geology and Geophysics Program of the Division of Ocean Sciences of the National Science Foundation funds four professionally run repositories that house samples collected by seagoing scientists. This award funds the curation, storage, and distribution of marine seafloor samples by the University of Rhode Island's Marine Geological Sample Laboratory. Samples are distributed upon request to scientists and educators wishing to better understand the ocean basins, the distribution of its resources, and how the Earth works. Over the past 3 years, this repository has distributed more than 8,000 samples of seafloor material to US and international scientists to advance our knowledge of the seafloor, ocean crust, mantle, seafloor volcanism, and the history of ocean chemistry and Earth's climate. Samples from the repositories have been used to pioneer new analytical techniques and provide important insights into seafloor, the continental margins, and sub-oceanic magmatic processes. This award augments a significant investment by the University of Rhode Island by supporting additional staffing in the form of a graduate student dedicated to working with the other repository staff to maintain the collection, collect and verify submitted information on the samples, and enter these data and metadata into an online database that makes the collection visible to interested parties via the Internet so scientists and educators can find and request samples for research and education. Broader impacts of the work include graduate level course involvement and public outreach via tours for primary and secondary school groups, local community organizations, and other interested parties. This award also provides support for an essential piece of marine geology infrastructure and provides support to an institution in a state that does not receive a significant amount of Federal funding (i.e., an EPSCoR state).