piloting through uncharted seas

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MOSS LANDING, CALIF.“Come on, just be a little bit careful because the tide’s low.” We hop on board the day boat Point Lobos, and Marcia Kemper McNutta marvel of efficiency on landnoticeably relaxes. This old hulk is the size of a tugboat, converted from ser- vicing offshore oil rigs to plying the canyons of Mon- terey Bay for science. “Hey, Knute, how was your day today?” she calls out to the pilot of a remotely operat- ed vehicle. She seems to know not just the first name but the welfare of every one of the 200-some engineers, scientists and operations crews who work for her. McNutt raised more than a few eyebrows when she left an endowed chair at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology four years ago. Not only was she odds-on favorite to become department head in a year, but she also held a key post associated with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, an estimable leviathan of ocean research. Instead she headed west to direct the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI, pronounced “em-BAHR-ee”), a relatively backwater in- stitute substantially overshadowed by its namesake sis- ter 20 miles south, the actual tourist-beloved aquarium. By McNutt’s logic, improving on the past depart- ment chair’s job at M.I.T. would be impossible. MBARI seemed “poised to make a huge impact,” she says. All it needed was some tweaking. Now, as president of MBARI, this 49-year-old Minneapolis native finds her- self one of the world’s most influential ocean scientists. Offbeat choices are nothing new for McNutt. She chose Colorado College even though her perfect-800 SAT scores could have gained her entry nearly any- where. Her adviser there discouraged her from taking physics, deeming it unsuitable for women. McNutt’s response: to switch advisers. She graduated summa cum laude with a physics degree in three years. Then, in the early 1970s, she read John F. Dewey’s article on plate tectonics in Scientific American. “This is so beautiful, so simple,” she recalls thinking of the then relatively new theory. “It’s got to be right.” She went on to obtain a Ph.D. in earth sciences at the Scripps Insti- tution of Oceanography in La Jolla, Calif. She began to travel to sea, sometimes to study the midocean ridge system, where plates meet and new oceanic crust forms. Science ships are tight for space, so students need- ed a skill to justify their presence. “I went out to be the shooter,” she remarks. A summer with the U.S. Navy SEALs taught McNutt how to handle explosives, wrap them in detonation cords and time the charges precisely PHOTOGRAPHS BY EDWARD CALDWELL Profile Piloting through Uncharted Seas The privately funded Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute enables scientists and engineers to engage in radical pursuits. As long as Marcia K. McNutt likes their ideas BY JOHN ADAM Husband, Ian Young; daughters Meredith and twins Ashley and Dana Best-known fact: president of 38,000-member American Geophysical Union Least-known fact: Navy SEAL-certified demolitions expert On research: “In principle, we still retain the concept of international waters. But the fact is that she who owns the technology owns the oceans.” MARCIA K. MCNUTT: GOING DEEP 38 SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN JUNE 2001 Copyright 2001 Scientific American, Inc.

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Page 1: Piloting through Uncharted Seas

MOSS LANDING, CALIF.—“Come on, just be a little bitcareful because the tide’s low.” We hop on board theday boat Point Lobos, and Marcia Kemper McNutt—a marvel of efficiency on land—noticeably relaxes. Thisold hulk is the size of a tugboat, converted from ser-vicing offshore oil rigs to plying the canyons of Mon-terey Bay for science. “Hey, Knute, how was your daytoday?” she calls out to the pilot of a remotely operat-ed vehicle. She seems to know not just the first name

but the welfare of every one of the 200-some engineers,scientists and operations crews who work for her.

McNutt raised more than a few eyebrows when sheleft an endowed chair at the Massachusetts Institute ofTechnology four years ago. Not only was she odds-onfavorite to become department head in a year, but shealso held a key post associated with the Woods HoleOceanographic Institution, an estimable leviathan ofocean research. Instead she headed west to direct theMonterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI,pronounced “em-BAHR-ee”), a relatively backwater in-stitute substantially overshadowed by its namesake sis-ter 20 miles south, the actual tourist-beloved aquarium.

By McNutt’s logic, improving on the past depart-ment chair’s job at M.I.T. would be impossible. MBARIseemed “poised to make a huge impact,” she says. Allit needed was some tweaking. Now, as president ofMBARI, this 49-year-old Minneapolis native finds her-self one of the world’s most influential ocean scientists.

Offbeat choices are nothing new for McNutt. Shechose Colorado College even though her perfect-800SAT scores could have gained her entry nearly any-where. Her adviser there discouraged her from takingphysics, deeming it unsuitable for women. McNutt’sresponse: to switch advisers. She graduated summacum laude with a physics degree in three years.

Then, in the early 1970s, she read John F. Dewey’sarticle on plate tectonics in Scientific American. “Thisis so beautiful, so simple,” she recalls thinking of the thenrelatively new theory. “It’s got to be right.” She went onto obtain a Ph.D. in earth sciences at the Scripps Insti-tution of Oceanography in La Jolla, Calif. She beganto travel to sea, sometimes to study the midocean ridgesystem, where plates meet and new oceanic crust forms.

Science ships are tight for space, so students need-ed a skill to justify their presence. “I went out to be theshooter,” she remarks. A summer with the U.S. NavySEALs taught McNutt how to handle explosives, wrapthem in detonation cords and time the charges precisely P

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Profile

Piloting through Uncharted SeasThe privately funded Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute enables scientists and engineers to engage in radical pursuits. As long as Marcia K. McNutt likes their ideas BY JOHN ADAM

■ Husband, Ian Young; daughters Meredith and twins Ashley and Dana■ Best-known fact: president of 38,000-member American Geophysical Union■ Least-known fact: Navy SEAL-certified demolitions expert■ On research: “In principle, we still retain the concept of international waters.

But the fact is that she who owns the technology owns the oceans.”

MARCIA K. MCNUTT: GOING DEEP

38 S C I E N T I F I C A M E R I C A N J U N E 2 0 0 1

Copyright 2001 Scientific American, Inc.

Page 2: Piloting through Uncharted Seas

so that a clean blast would acousticallymap ocean geology. “I love going to sea,”she says. “There’s a camaraderie. Every-one is focused on the same mission.” Sheeventually met her husband, a captain,when she was chief scientist at sea. Mc-Nutt manages to continue her geophysicsresearch—in May she joined an instituteresearch vessel off Hawaii to examine hotspots. But she spends most of her timekeeping MBARI shipshape.

The institute is the brainchild of DavidPackard. The billionaire engineer and co-founder of Hewlett-Packard took a keeninterest in oceans during the last years ofhis life, thanks in part to his daughters,who studied marine science. Packardfounded MBARI in 1987 as a private-sector complement to gov-ernment-dominated ocean research. Engineers working besidetop scientists could, he believed, open up deep-ocean research.

The David and Lucile Packard Foundation pours about $40million a year into MBARI. Researchers there, unencumberedby teaching or the federal grant application process, can movenimbly, assuming McNutt likes their ideas. They can also car-ry out risky long-term technology-intensive projects that mightotherwise be quashed under peer review. One example: 12years of monitoring for global temperature change from Mon-terey Bay ultimately paid off, McNutt explains, when “wecould see a trend in the data” showing that the bay’s relative-ly small increase in temperature resulted in disproportionatelylarge decreases in its algal biomass productivity.

Unlike other institutes, MBARI schedules its growing fleet ofvessels on its own. (Other institutes, beholden to federal funds,cooperatively schedule their fleets for the nation’s marine scien-tists.) Such autonomy endows McNutt’s post with great influ-ence. It is “much more powerful than a typical institution’s di-rector” position, says G. Ross Heath of the University of Wash-ington, who was McNutt’s predecessor at MBARI. Shortlyafter Packard died in 1996, McNutt became director. AlthoughPackard is still revered at MBARI, his presence made it toughfor others to move without fear of being second-guessed.

McNutt stepped in just as MBARI’s new buildings, its tworesearch ships, its two remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) andits systems for acquiring and cataloguing information were op-erational, or nearly so. “We underestimated the time it wouldtake to build a new institute,” confesses Julie Packard, who as-sumed the chair of MBARI’s board from her father. Only now,she says, with all the equipment working well, are the scientif-ic benefits being reaped, as shown by a rise in MBARI-affiliat-ed authorship in prestigious journals.

Credit McNutt for smoothing relations and squeezing the

most out of her diverse crew. One of herfirst actions was to shift some engineersinto coveted ocean-view offices that hadbeen an exclusive province of scientists.(Her own office is efficiently austere, witha view of the twin smokestacks across theharbor.) MBARI engineers bring scien-tists vicariously to ever greater depths.The institute’s first ROV, modified froman oil-industry machine, dove to depthsof nearly two kilometers; its second hadmore homemade innovations and reachedfour kilometers. McNutt proudly showsme MBARI’s yellow autonomous under-water vehicle, still in the shop; the sub-mersible will soon be swimming unteth-ered as deep as 4.5 kilometers and will

launch from MBARI’s third research vessel, the Zephyr.For the most part, the ocean’s major events remain unob-

served. “Plankton bloom. Volcanoes erupt. Plates slip in earth-quakes. Fish spawn,” McNutt says. “The chance of being in theright time and in the right place to catch such events in actionis very small.” Eventually schools of swimming robots couldremedy that. In short, it’s a race to see whether these tools canbe made to address such pressing oceanic problems as globalwarming, energy production and sustainable fisheries.

With all the various interests seeking to exploit or conservethe ocean, McNutt keeps an open mind and has learned to mod-erate controversy with lessons learned from home. “So manytimes my twins get into an argument. Both are absolutely firmin their convictions. And if you say to either one of them they’rewrong, then they start tuning you out.” So McNutt tries to makethe 15-year-olds aware of the other’s position and values.

That trick apparently worked when McNutt recentlychaired the President’s Panel on Ocean Exploration. First shemade sure the committee had no deadweight. “We didn’t wantpeople sitting around the table, taking up space and wastingour time when they aren’t in a position to give first-class scienceinput,” she recalls. The group of eminent scientists and educa-tors reached a consensus calling for a 10-year, $750-million ef-fort to inventory and explore the Exclusive Economic Zone (anarea that extends 200 nautical miles from all U.S. coasts), con-tinental margins, the Arctic and other regions.

With roughly 95 percent of the ocean unknown and unex-plored, it would seem that McNutt has much work ahead. Sheintends to add another 60 permanent positions and bring in awider assortment of visiting scientists and student interns tokeep MBARI connected with the broader research communi-ty—and, she hopes, a step or two ahead.

John Adam is a technology writer based in Washington, D.C.

w w w . s c i a m . c o m S C I E N T I F I C A M E R I C A N 39

PRIDE OF MBARI: McNutt with a submersible andon a data-gathering mooring (opposite page).

Copyright 2001 Scientific American, Inc.