Only so many people can live aboard a research ship. And although a large vessel may accommodate a science party of 30, half must be engineers who maintain and operate the ROVs.
The number of researchers is thus limited by ship space, as well as by scheduling, budgets, and other real-world concerns. Telepresence provides an intriguing solution.
"When you're doing exploration, you're never sure what expertise you'll need, because you're never sure what you'll find," Coleman said. "This technology provides the capability to network in experts on a specific subject from around the world. You can invite everybody aboard the ship."
The technology seems to have a bright future. NOAA is converting a former U.S. Navy vessel, the U.S.N.S. Capable, into a research vessel dubbed the Okeanos Explorer (okeanos is the ancient Greek term for "ocean"). The ship will be specially outfitted for future telepresence missions.
Of course, telepresence technology isn't exactly like being at sea.
In her online expedition log, co-chief scientist Deborah Kelley described the nearly surreal scene as Hercules first touched bottom. Kelley and her science team watched the action via cameras carried by Argus, hovering some 100 feet (30 meters) above the seafloor.
"This was a view like no other I had ever seen," she reported. "In the dark of the room at the UW with our first views of the bottom, I felt as if I was suddenly in the control room on the ship."
"Later, walking out into the lit hallway in Mary Gates Hall, I was struck by the sharp contrast of being immersed within the environment of an ocean 4,500 miles away and nearly one half mile [0.8 kilometers] down and that of a sunny Seattle day with Mt. Rainier in full view."
A Natural Atlantis
The Lost City is an undersea hot spring region unlike any other known to science. Kelley and her team at the University of Washington discovered the region by accident during a manned submersible expedition in 2000.
The site boasts dramatic, 90- to 200-foot-high (30- to 60-meter-high) carbonate "chimneys" that vent methane and hydrogen-rich fluids. The pale towers, which host a great diversity of marine life, inspired the scientists to name their find after the mythical city of Atlantis.
The site resembles undersea vent systems found along ridges in the seafloor where tectonic plates are spreading apart.
Escaping hot volcanic gas at these vents creates a sunless but nutrient-rich environment that supports creatures such as tubeworms, mussels, shrimp, and large clams. The vents, first discovered nearly 30 years ago, changed scientific perspective on how and where life can exist on Earth.
The Lost City formation, found 9 miles (14 kilometers) from the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, is the first evidence that other areas of the ocean could contain such ecosystems.
Using ROVs in addition to manned submersibles, the scientists hope to learn more about the type of organisms that can thrive near hydrothermal systems.
And thanks to telepresence technology, scientists weren't the only ones who could join the most recent Lost City expedition from remote sites half a world away.
Immersion Presents, IFE's sister organization, transferred live feeds and produced programs that allowed educators, Boys and Girls Clubs, museums, and libraries in the United States and Mexico to take part.
"We want to connect the general public to ocean exploration through satellite and Internet technology," Coleman said.
In fact, the live views from Hercules and Argus were often available to anyone, anywhere in the world, who had an Internet connection via the Immersion Presents Web site.
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