Take Proper Distance: Sea to Space Expeditions Operating

Needs no introduction -Elon Musk Main Man at Space X working Space and Sea links in multilevels

Sometimes all you need is a little distance to take things to the next level. The stars in the sky look the way they do because of the distance there is from their original light source to us here on Earth. Some say there is nothing better for Science than looking things straight up, to be on the ground but this is not always the case.

When it comes down to the Ocean, distances rule. The distance to the bottom of the deepest part of the Ocean -where life is believed to have originated here on Earth is so profound that no human being can dive into those waters. Some scientists are not discouraged by distances but inspired by them.

Schmidt Ocean Institute reported on January 31 from the Cruise Log of the Expedition Sea to Space Particle Investigation.

“When people think of science, the first examples that come to mind are often dramatic triumphs -the moon landing, the invention of DNA sequencing, or the discovery of the polio vaccine. Almost every exciting experimental result, however, is the result of an enormous amount of unseen effort. Thorough preparation, resourceful improvisation, success, failure, and improvement through trial and error are all deeply familiar to any researcher!,” Seaver Wang Scientists aboard the Schmidt Ocean Institute Expedition blogged away.

This is true. If you are looking for quick and easy fix Science is not the go-to-place for you. Science has its own pace, is often overwhelmed by questions and requires tremendous efforts and distances.

Distances in the ocean are overwhelming. Crossing an Ocean from coast to coast takes weeks even in the fastest  boats. There is immensity to it all. Coral reefs expand in distances that complicate science. Even in the micro-realm the distances are huge. In the World of microorganisms -plankton and such - great contributors to the balance of our planet distances also rule in another scale. Distances exist in the Ocean between species, ecological interconnectivity, interconnections and biochemical reactions. Distances are overwhelming for science...but distance can be used to learn and take it all in.

And Science has done more for humankind than any other discipline practiced by our Global society and taken us further than any method. The truth is that us humans are far from knowing a mere fraction of the mysteries of life and of the ocean.

Why do you think government and international organisations throw billions of dollars into scientific research and exploration -and the number keeps growing to find solutions and understanding of climate change? The amount of funding is just another sign of the distances which we need to cover to reach some understanding...

This year Schmidt Teamed up with NASA Goddard because they could not handle the distances on their own. The 2017 Sea to Space Particle Investigation is one of the many International scientific missions out to gather data to understand Oceans studying them from the ground here on Earth as well as from Space. Distance for this understanding is required.

“Particles in the Ocean are considered by scientists to be anything that is not dissolved. This could include dust, phytoplankton, fecal pellets, fish, and even logs or marine debris. Studying how these pieces of matter are spread out and grouped according to their size can provide insight to marine biodiversity, ecosystem health, and aspects of biogeochemical cycling, including the oceanic carbon cycle,” Sea to Space Particle Agenda reads word by word.    

Schmidt believes that investigating ocean particles will open up critical information that will help improve our understanding of “how Earth’s living marine resources and carbon sequestration are responding to rising carbon dioxide levels as well as climate changes”.

The “expedition will allow an unprecedented view into the biological, geological, and chemical mechanics of the ocean - both in a local and global manner”. What does this mean? It means that the Schmidt scientists will study water samples to provide one perspective and dimension to the study and use Spaceborne technology to give the study a global dimension and vision. Schmidt recognizes that taking on these kinds of study only on boat is impossible. They teamed up with Dr. Ivona Cetinic from NASA Goddard Space Flight Center-USRA along with co-investigators Dr. Wayne Homer Slade, Dr. P. Jeremy Werdell, and Dr. Margaret Estapa to step up the game.

NASA has been interested in microorganisms and plankton for long years now. They call phytoplanktons the “Green Machines” of our Planet. And we should just take their word for it because let's face it no one has cooler or more high tech operations out there than NASA, they are the silent observer.

But it does not take big names and big funding to take on distances and TARA -the small boat which changed the World of Ocean Science knows a thing or two about this. This year they continue moving on to study the Pacific Ocean Coral Reefs in a Grand Scale.

The Tara Pacific Expedition 2016-2018 is also a distance lover. The expedition is unique because it will cover a huge geographical area – the Pacific Ocean. Their goal is corals and surrounding waters and the area they chose is where 40% of the World's Corals call home.

“A study on this scale has never before been accomplished,” TARA says.

In total the team aboard TARA will sail over 100 thousand kilometers for more than 2 years. Not only is TARA taking on climate change, DNA sequencing and ecology they are looking for hints of resistance, adaptation and resilience and of course this leads to potential applications for medical research.

From the Panama Canal to the archipelago of Japan, from New Zealand to China , TARA will cut through 11 Time Zones of the World’s largest ocean, and visit the most remote islands and reefs.

Approaches of using distances as an ally for scientific studies and tendencies of combining ocean studies with satellite studies are only growing. In the Great Coral Barrier NASA CORAL Mission continues operating. They assure they are capturing the best ever portrait of Coral Reef Health in History.

NASA understood that distance was the only way to “get up close and personal with Earth's Corals” -their very words. NASA CORAL Diving operations in the water and airborne operations in the sky over the Great Barrier Reef are far from over they have months to go before completion just like TARA and just like the Schmidt Ocean Institute Sea to Space Particle Investigation.  

But taking on long time consuming research expeditions is dealing with day to day challenges. At Schmidt´s Sea to Space Expedition Researcher Seaver Wang ran us the wires of the first day challenges. Whatever problem they have on board the 271 Falkor scientific investigation vessel will need to be solved using only the resources they have with them.

Bad weather and gear damage are among the usual problems in any kind of ship.

“Our first days at sea have presented their fair share of challenges. Our cruise plans have changed almost daily in order to adapt to weather patterns and the ship’s capabilities in terms of speed and range. For my research, which involves measuring dissolved gases from seawater to detect plankton activity, plumbing has been my biggest enemy so far,” Seaver Wang wrote.

Seaver Wang inventively dealt with a broken valve of his essential plumbing gear in what he described as “several long hours” to “fix a boring problem”. And yes let's face it science -as life itself can be boring sometimes no matter what a science recruiter may say.

“In the end, we spent several hours fixing this incredibly boring problem -one which has very little to do with actual science. Paradoxically, however, all of our tinkering with tubes and faucets was essential in order to perform my research. This is just one of the many small challenges that we have dealt with as we prepare for one of the busiest parts of our expedition. Even though many of our problem-solving stories will never be mentioned when we publish our research results, they are just as much of a part of our science as designing experiments or picking locations for the Falkor to explore,” Wang enlightened us on the truth of scientific expeditions and life.

The Schmidt´s Falkor running the Sea to Space Particle Expedition will navigate from Honolulu to Seattle extracting samples and data from the ocean's basin. Remote-sensing data will also be gathered by NASA and the United States Geological Survey at the same time, observing the same areas where the team is working.

Still today NASA feels the need to answer basic questions as if they have not been answered decades ago but rolling with their inspiring persistence to involve the general public we conceded and echo their questions and answers.

“Why study ocean particles and ocean color? And why NASA? Rolling with the waves on the research vessel Falkor, we’re searching for particles -primarily microscopic marine plants called phytoplankton, which play an important role in supporting life on Earth. Ocean phytoplankton come in many sizes, colors and types. This diversity determines their roles in the marine food web and our ability to distinguish them from Earth-observing satellites. With improved optical instrumentation, we hope to regularly monitor their unique spectral signatures, or colors, from space,” NASA deeply involved in the Schmidt Institute Expedition explains.

Working parallely on their own micro-world researcher is the German Organization GEOMAR. Their work in the past years has also been more than inspiring. They also recognized the vast distances that we still need to cover.

Their “Plankton Puzzle” report calls for any person scientists or not to help solve what they call a “Gigantic Task”.

Marine biologists from the GEOMAR Germany and researchers from France want to sort more than 50,000 images of unicellular marine microorganisms belonging to the group Rhizaria.

“In order to reach this aim the researchers are asking for support from interested people outside the scientific community. Non-scientists are invited to participate in the evaluation of this unique data set of marine research. All they have to do is to play a kind of memory game. On the website https://planktonid.geomar.de people are asked to compare images and allocate them to certain plankton groups. No previous knowledge is required. Computing processes in the background ensure that errors in the attribution do not affect the overall result. For example, each image must be identified at least ten times by different users before it can be incorporated into the research,” GEOMAR explains assures that the Game is ON!  

“Anyone who feels like it can make a meaningful contribution to our research and become a part of the discovery process,“ says Dr Rainer Kiko, marine biologist at GEOMAR and project coordinator of the new citizen-science project PlanktonID.

The unicellular Rhizaria belong to the zooplankton. They are an important nutrition source for fish and other larger organisms. Like other plankton groups, Rhizaria also perform other functions in the ocean. When dying and sinking to the ocean floor, they transport carbon from the surface to the deep sea, for example. Thus they play an important role in the carbon cycle of the Earth and for the Global Climate.

“We hope to involve as many people as possible in our project and to learn more about the secrets of the ocean together with them,” the Project Coordinator Svenja Christiansen from GEOMAR said. “All you need is good eyes, a bit of care and a computer.” Let's hope you got both of those.

Perhaps the greatest challenging distance is the one that is found within our daily lives and daily thoughts. To be able to change the way we think about things to be able to disarm old mental habits to find new inspiring perspectives is the start of a this long road. Our daily lives may consume us to a point of no return if we allow them to do so. But if we take the time to really find the distance to allow a new perspective into our World amazing things can happen and do happen.