The causes of natural calamities, ocean acidification and its link to air pollution, soil erosion and its impact, why people get drowned in Visakhapatnam beaches and beach morphological variations were explained to those who made their way to the National Institute of Oceanography (NIO) on New Year’s day.
As part of its 51st Foundation Day, the institute opened its doors to the public and students on Sunday.
While instruments used to procure water samples and conduct ocean research were exhibited at the bio-geochemistry laboratory located at Vidya Nagar, videos that depict oceanographic activities and study material pertaining to underwater wealth and marine ecosystem were put up at the institute located at Lawson’s Bay Colony.
Besides the ‘open day’, the day-long programme organised by the Council of Scientific Industrial Research (CSIR)-NIO included lecture on naval systems and ocean delivered by Director of Naval Science Technological Laboratory (NSTL) O.R. Nandagopan.
Scientist in-charge of NIO V.S.N. Murthy spoke about the overall achievements of the CSIR-NIO and salient features of several oceanographic observations. Speaking on the occasion, Dr. Murthy told The Hindu that the annual event was meant to create awareness on various characteristics of the marine biological activities and the findings of the lab. “Some of the videos also include seabed mining of polymetallic nodules and research-based mining operations. These nodules are rich in minerals such as cobalt, copper, nickel and manganese. Though the International Seabed Authority gave deepsea mining permission to India in the allocated area of Central Indian Ocean Basin, the biggest challenge lies in developing the right technology for the purpose,” said the chief scientist.
According to him, the celebrations aim at providing insights into the marine world and stimulating interest among students to take up research.
