The open ocean - A Fascination for Fish: Adventures of an Underwater Pioneer - page 251

Aquarium Research Institute, devoted to research into the biology, ge-
ology, chemistry, and dynamics of the Monterey submarine canyon and
development of the technology necessary to carry out this work. Among
its considerable resources were a land-based research facility in Moss
Landing, complete with laboratories, o‹ces, and machine shops; an
oceangoing research vessel; and a remotely operated vehicle, or ROV,
capable of working to depths of about three thousand feet.
Although MBARI was funded separately from the aquarium,
Packard's vision was that the two institutions would form a close and
cooperative relationship that would benefit both education and science.
The decision to interpret the deep sea as one of the two major themes
of the aquarium's new wing was therefore a logical choice. In addition,
we had been conducting valuable research at the aquarium itself—the
progress we had already made in the keeping of jellyfish was a good
start on the work we needed to do to develop open ocean exhibits.
I was well aware that, from the standpoint of exhibiting live animals,
these two environments would be tough to pull o¤. There were so many
unknowns. How, for example, would open ocean animals, living as they
do in a vast world without walls, deal with the necessary boundaries
of a tank?
The deep sea was even riskier. Just the collecting of fragile animals
living hundreds or even thousands of feet below the surface was daunt-
ing. How well would they survive after being brought up from their
cold realm of darkness, low oxygen, and high pressure? How would tanks
need to be designed to accommodate these animals' di¤erent needs?
Pondering the big job before us, we decided the exhibits should be
done in two separate phases: first the open ocean, with the deep sea
coming some time later.
A great deal of R&D needed to be done on both subjects before we'd
know what we could and couldn't do. Yet we also had an aquarium to
run, and our top priorities were keeping the animals we had and main-
taining the quality of the exhibits. The husbandry department sta¤
was extremely busy.
Fortunately, the year before, I'd approached Julie Packard and asked
if I could hire two additional husbandry sta¤, explaining the need to
work on new ideas. In keeping with the Hewlett Packard philosophy
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