ANNUAL REPORT 1987-1988 NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF OCEANOGRAPHY Dona Paula, Goa-403 004, India NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF OCEANOGRAPHY DONA PAULA - 403 004, GOA, INDIA. Grams : OCEANOLOGY, PANJIM Telephones : 6253, 6254, 6255, 6256 & 5988 Telex : 0194 - 216 NIO IN 4612 (Director's Off) 0194 - 316 MGGIN 4909 (Director's Res.) REGIONAL CENTRES National Institute of Oceanography Telephones : 6263773, 6264807, Regional Centre Sea Shell Building Grams: OCEANOLOGY BOMBAY. Seven Buglows Versova Telex : 011 - 71182 NIO B Bombay - 400 061 National Institute of Oceanography Telephone : 360306 Regional Centre Vidyaniketan Annex Building Grams : OCEANOLOGY ERNAKULAM House No. 41/591 - B Providence Road Ernakulam Cochin - 682 018 National Institute of Oceanography Telephone : 69794 Regional Centre 52, Kirlampudi Layout Grams : OSTECHLAB VISHAKHAPATNAM Vishakhapatnam - 530 023 Cover Photograph: Red Tide (Trichodesmium Bloom) along the west coast of India. ANNUAL REPORT 23 NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF OCEANOGRAPHY (Council of Scientific & Industrial Research) Dona Paula - 403 004 Goa, India. PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY Director, National Institute of Oceanography COMPILED AND EDITED BY Publication and Reprography Section EDITORIAL PERSONNEL Shri V. Kesava Das Shri S.J.D.Veraprasad Mrs. R. Thomas Mrs. C. Ribeiro DESIGNED TYPE-SET AND PRINTED BY TAGS GRAPHICS 5, Shradhanjali, Sir Vithaldas Nagar, Sarojini Naidu Road, Santa Cruz (West), Bombay-54. Phone: 53 80 30. 1987-88 ANNUAL REPORT N.I.O. 1. Director's Report 1 2. Highlights 3 3. List of Projects 8 4. R & D Activities 9 4.1 Physical Oceanography 9 4.2 Chemical Oceanography 16 4.3 Geological Oceanography 27 4.4 Biological Oceanography 33 4.5 Marine Corrosion & Materials Research 41 4.6 Integrated Studies of Estuaries 46 4.7 Ocean Engineering 49 4.8 Marine Instrumentation 55 4.9 Surveys for Polymetallic Nodules 59 4.10 Antarctic Oceanography 61 4.11 Marine Archaeology 64 4.12 Data and Information 66 4.13 Publications and Public Relations 70 4.14 Training 73 4.15 Planning 74 5. International/Bilateral Programmes 75 6. Sponsored Projects 80 7. Oceanographic Cruises 86 8. Infrastructure 92 9. Visitors 98 10. Awards, Honours and Memberships 100 11. Deputations 104 12. Participation in Seminars, Symposia and Meetings 109 13. Publications 116 14. Budget 123 15. Composition of various Committees of NIO 124 16. Appointments/Transfers/Resignations 133 17. Scientific, Technical and Administrative Staff 135 ORGANISATIONAL CHART 1987-88 ANNUAL REPORT N.I.O N.I.O. ANNUAL REPORT 1987-88 1987-88 ANNUAL REPORT N.I.O. DIRECTOR'S REPORT India achieved a significant landmark in ocean research by becoming the first country in the world to obtain rights for mining the polymetallic nodules in the Central Indian Ocean from the United Nations. A major contribution towards this achievement was made by NIO by studying and delineating the nodule bearing areas in the Central Indian Ocean. This has provided India with exclusive mining rights over an area of 150,000 sq. km. while an equal area has been declared reserved for the International Seabed Authority under the United Nations. NIO has played a leading role in another national programme on Antarctic Research. The Seventh Antarctic Expedition was led by Dr. R. Sengupta, a senior scientist of NIO, and the team included four more scientists from the Institute. During this expedition valuable current data was obtained for the first time from Polynya, east of the Weddel Sea by moor- ing an array of current meters, which supplemented other oceanographic studies. Major thrust, during the year, has been given to the oceanography of the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of India. An oceanographic atlas for the EEZ of India, first of its kind, was published. This atlas depicts the horizontal distribution of physical, chemical and biological parameters at different levels based on the data collected onboard R.V. Gaveshani during the period 1976-80. The research vessels Gaveshani and Sagar Kanya were mainly deployed for the thrust area programme in the EEZ, in order to make a sys- tematic coverage and to fill area-wise and season-wise gaps in the data. At the request of Government of Mauritius, NIO in association with the Department of Ocean Development has undertaken studies in the EEZ of Mauritius during September - October, 1987. The Institute also participated in the International Ocean Festival held at Mauritius from 4 to 13 September, 1987. On this occasion an exhibition was organised on board ORV Sagar Kanya which was visited by thousands of people from all walks of life. A few scientists from Mauritius were given onboard training in oceanographic data collection techniques, data processing and interpretation. International collaboration with Norway, USA and FRG was continued in the fields of ocean engineering, bioactive substances from the sea and corrosion, and palaeoclimatic studies respectively. Apart from these, the Indo-USSR collaborative programme on the monsoon dynamics was also initiated. In addition to the regular R & D programmes, 14 new sponsored projects, 5 consultancy projects and 17 grant-in-aid projects were undertaken by the Institute with a contract value of about 2.014 crores rupees. The total cash flow from outside agencies during the year was about 2.464 crores rupees which constitutes about 52.5% of C.S.I.R. input. The main sponsors were ONGC, Port Trusts, Industries and Govt. Departments. 1 N.I.O. ANNUAL REPORT 1987-88 A national project on training, inter-calibration and marine pollution monitoring, funded by DOD was initiated with NIO as the co-ordinating and main implementation agency. One inter-calibration exercise among the 14 participating laboratories in the project, was or- ganised and the results have been communicated to Department of Ocean Development. A second such exercise is in progress. Several scientists of NIO were deputed for participation and presentation of scientific papers in symposia, seminars and workshops held in the country as well as abroad. A good number of scientists were sent for training in advanced and emerging areas in the country and abroad. Moreover, several inhouse training programmes were conducted for the benefit of scientists and technical staff of NIO and other organisations. One hundred and fifty one research papers were published in standard Indian and Inter- nationals journals. A few special publications such as the Data Inventories, Mahasagar, NIO Newsletter and Collected Reprints were brought out in time. A Remote Sensing Centre was established at NIO during the year. The process of upgrada- tion of the Computer Centre was given a boost and we are nearing the commissioning of the new system being procured from Norway and installed at the new computer centre. The upgradation of the computer will enhance the computational power for the new era of seismic data processing, large scale image processing and computer aided design and modelling. The facilities onboard R.V. Gaveshani and ORV Sagar Kanya were utilised by several organisations including Universities. R.V. Gaveshani and ORV Sagar Kanya suc- cessfully completed 13 and 9 cruises respectively in the Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal. Dr. S.W.A. Naqvi a colleague scientist, received the "Young Scientist Award" instituted by CSIR and another colleague Dr. M.D. Zingde received young scientist Gold Medal from the Society of Biosciences. One scientist received D.Sc, and six others received Ph.D. during the year. I record here my gratitude to the sponsors of various projects, the retiring members of the Research Advisory Council and Executive Committee and others, who guided our ap- proaches and supported various activities. I am thankful to all my colleagues whose relent- less efforts and contributions brought credit to the Institute and hope that they will gear up for a better performance with greater dedication. Highlights of the research findings and detailed report of various R & D activities are given in the following chapters. B.N. DESAI DIRECTOR 2 1987-88 ANNUAL REPORT N.I.O. 2. HIGHLIGHTS PHYSICAL PROCESSES A numerical model developed for the Amba River has been used to determine the tidal ex- cursion at various places along the river. This would help to determine the fate of pollutants introduced into the river, i.e. whether they are flushed out or not. The oil-spill risk analysis model has been upgraded to take into consideration the move- ment of spilled oil due to wind and currents, spreading and evaporation. A hydrodynamical - numerical model of tides and storm surges has been developed for the east coast of India for hindcasting storm surges and computing design water levels for ocean engineering applications. For many practical purposes the wind-wave systems on sea surface are considered to be linear. The linear systems are well represented by a variance spectrum and a random (Uniform) phase spectrum. But many important processes like wave breaking, wave drift, wave groups, etc. could be explained only by non-linear theory. For understanding the non-linear processes better, simulated wave profiles which are generated using coupled (non-Uniform) phase spectrum have been developed. A new spectral width parameter has been defined for all types of sea states even includ- ing multipeaked ones. This is found to be more dependable than the conventional spectral width parameter which is defined only for narrow band wave spectrum. CLIMATE The failure of the Indian summer monsoon during the last three years has been found to be related to the anomalous eastward shift of the Pacific Ocean warm pool in the central Pacific Ocean. It was found that the mid-May sea surface temperatures over the Bay of Bengal have high correlation with the total rainfall over India. A descriptive model of these features have been developed in terms of east-west circulation. The role of the Arabian Sea evaporation in monsoon rainfall along the west coast of India has been studied for active, normal and weak monsoon seasons.