Conference Themes & Highlights
The four threads that organized the symposium
Sensing technologies across scales
Fiber-optic Distributed Acoustic Sensing (DAS) turns existing seafloor cables into thousands of in-line seismometers, while autonomous vehicles and ROVs map the bottom from regional scale down to centimeters. Together they are producing continuous, multi-scale observations — the measurement infrastructure that process-based seafloor science requires.
Sediment transport, source to sink
Roughly 34 million tonnes of sediment reach the California coast each year, much of it captured by submarine canyons and funneled to the deep ocean by turbidity currents. The Monterey Canyon system, arguably the world's best-monitored submarine canyon, anchors decades of work connecting rivers, coasts, canyons, and the deep-sea record.
Hazards and the long view
A sixty-year arc — from 1960s sediment cores to the recognition of the great Cascadia earthquakes — shows how patient, long-term seafloor science underpins societal resilience. The same tools now offer real-time payoffs, from fault imaging near critical infrastructure to seconds of additional earthquake early warning.
Carbon, ecology, and stewardship
From blue-carbon accounting and deep-sea mineral impacts to long-term coral observation and a proposed ocean alkalinity enhancement testbed in Monterey Bay, this thread connects seafloor science directly to climate and conservation decisions — and to the measurement capacity those decisions demand.