Coordination Funds

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The International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP) aims at studying the seafloor through scientific drilling in order to improve our understanding of past oceans and subseafloor processes. IODP was launched in October 2013 and is the successor of earlier marine scientific drilling programs including the Deep Sea Drilling Project (DSDP, 1968 - 1983), the Ocean Drilling Program (1983 - 2003) and the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP, 2003-2013). The overall objectives of the new program are summarized in the science plan "Illuminating Earth´s Past, Present and Future". This science plan comprises four major themes subdivided into 14 challenges which in turn address new, forward-looking questions, methods and models: 1) "Climate and Ocean Change": One of the most important scientific challenges is to better understand rates and causes of global climate change and its consequences. Studying paleoclimate archives from the deep-sea will allow better constraining past climate change including the sensitivity of ice sheets and sea-level. This in turn can help to reduce uncertainties in predicting future climates. 2) "Biosphere Frontiers": This theme addresses the biosphere below the sea-floor, specifically to understand the global importance of microbial communities and its participation in the global carbon cycle, but also the physical and chemical limits for reproduction and dispersal. Another major challenge in this theme is the study the sensitivity of marine ecosystems and biodiversity to environmental change. 3) "Earth Connections": Within this theme geochemical exchange processes between the subsurface, specifically the upper mantle, and the exogenic system are addressed. These processes include the interaction of the Earth surface and subduction zones as well as oceanic crust production and alteration. 4) "Earth in Motion": This theme aims at short-term geodynamic processes that are of direct societal relevance like seismogenic zones, landslides and tsunamis. In addition, this theme also facilitates studies of sub-seafloor carbon sequestration and the installation of subseafloor observatories.