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Overview
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Mission
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The University of Washington's Regional Scale Nodes or RSN of the NSF OOI will extend continuous high-bandwidth (tens of Gigabits/second) and power (tens of kilowatts) to a network of instruments widely distributed across, above, and below the seafloor in the northeast Pacific Ocean.
The University of Washington was selected to begin leading the regional component of the NSF Ocean Observatories Initiative: The Regional Scale Nodes (RSN). This cabled underwater research facility will be constructed off the Oregon and Washington coastlines.
The RSN will extend continuous high-bandwidth (tens of Gigabits/second) and power (tens of kilowatts) to a network of instruments widely distributed across, above and below the seafloor in the northeast Pacific Ocean.
As the world's first ocean observatory to span a tectonic plate, this facility will provide a constant stream of data in real time from the ocean, on the seafloor, and below the seafloor within the Juan de Fuca plate.
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UW OOI Regional Component Home Page |
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The oceans of Earth are crucial to the quality of life on land. Yet they are mysterious, dangerous, and unexplored. The mission of the NSF Ocean Observatories Initiative is to launch a new era of human discovery within the world's oceans through electrical power and high speed internet connectivity in large portions of the global ocean. Land-based scientists, engineers, educators, and the public will remotely interact with ocean events as if they were actually in the ocean environment-events such as erupting volcanoes, migrating fish, major earthquakes and storms, powerful currents, blooms of microscopic life, and subtle climatic variability.
In September 2012, the RSN Junction Box engineering team at APL-UW achieved an important milestone—they conducted interface testing after connecting a prototype of a low-power junction box to three standard oceanographic instruments planned for deployment on the RSN system.
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More About Interface Testing of Junction Box |
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Location of high power and bandwidth moorings with profiling capabilities on the RSN. One mooring will be placed at the base of Axial Seamount, providing measurements key to examining flow over rough topography, El Niño and La Niña events, and the Pacific Decadal Oscillation. A second mooring will be located at the base of the accretionary margin outboard from Hydrate Ridge. This mooring forms an array with three surface and three subsurface (two of which are cabled to the RSN) moorings that are part of the Coastal Scale Endurance Array.
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Research Links
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Ocean Observatories Initiative's Regional Scale Nodes
UW OOI Regional Component Home Page |
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RSN In The News
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New lab to give scientists underwater access KIRO TV, Donna Gordon Blankinship Scientists are eager for access to information from a quarter-billion dollar lab at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean that they hope will teach them about climate change, earthquakes and even the origins of life on Earth and other planets. |
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19 May 2013 
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Getting ready for the world's largest underwater observatory KUOW Radio, Ashley Ahearn The Regional Cabled Observatory is a $239 million project funded by the National Science Foundation. The goal: to better understand and monitor the depths of the Pacific Ocean — from volcanic eruptions to deep-sea earthquakes that could lead to tsunamis. |
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17 Apr 2013
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Preparing to install the world's largest underwater observatory UW News and Information, Hannah Hickey The National Science Foundation in 2009 launched the $239 million effort led by John Delaney, UW professor of oceanography, to create a cabled observatory that will bring power and Internet to the ocean floor. This new concept will use remote-controlled instruments and high-bandwidth video to create an enduring, real-time presence in the deep ocean. |
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More Info
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15 Apr 2013
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Researchers in the UW's Applied Physics Laboratory were tasked by Delaney to build and test the equipment that will make up the observatory. Much of that equipment will be installed this summer. This is the biggest project the 70-year-old marine engineering institute has ever undertaken, said project lead Gary Harkins, a principal engineer with the lab.
"This concept of a real-time observatory will change what we do as ocean engineers, what we will learn how to do, and what ocean scientists can do with these systems now and in the future," Harkins said.
The cabled observatory, known as the Regional Scale Nodes project, is part of the national Ocean Observatories Initiative, an effort to integrate U.S. measurements of the ocean and seafloor. Other partners will build coastal and global observing networks, manage the data and conduct educational outreach. The Pacific Northwest observatory will span the Juan de Fuca tectonic plate off the Washington and Oregon coasts, the likely source of the next large regional earthquake.
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UW leads ambitious effort to monitor the ocean The Seattle Times, Theodoric Meyer A group of University of Washington scientists spent part of the summer wiring the ocean floor to monitor ocean events in real time, a project expected to be completed in 2014. APL-UW engineers explain the challenging environments of the deep sea and active seafloor volcanoes that must be addressed. |
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7 Sep 2012
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UW team deploying power and Internet to the sea floor Geek Wire, Molly Brown In further news about awesome people doing awesome things, a team from the University of Washington is installing a series of nodes on the sea floor — something akin to a "giant electrical outlet" the size of a Volkswagen Beetle — to provide Internet connectivity and power for real-time observations of the ocean. |
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31 Jul 2012
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Undersea cable laid for 'transformative' ocean observatory KUOW Radio, Tom Banse This spring, there was a big volcanic eruption in the Pacific Northwest. It happened under the ocean off the northern Oregon coast. All this week, a University of Washington research ship is streaming live video via satellite of lava flows in the undersea crater. |
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24 Aug 2011
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