Public lecture by Dr. Ken Johnson of Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute

Today, much of the ocean that covers 75% of our planet is remote and seldom visited or observed.  Our ability to detect changes in the ocean that we believe are occurring - the warming of the water and increases in acidity – is made difficult due to the lack of measurements on a global scale.   In collaboration with satellite observing systems (which are effective at detecting global patterns but only at the surface), a global array of robotic sensing platforms is under development to meet this challenge.  At present, over 4000 robots are silently probing the ocean depths and sending back critical data on changes in ocean physics, biology and chemistry. 

Dr. Ken Johnson is a leading world expert on the development of novel ocean sensors for use on robotic platforms and will discuss these efforts and future plans.