An underwater bioluminescence assessment tool (U-BAT) Navy STTR FY2005 Sol No.: Navy STTR FY2005 Topic No.: N05-T026 Topic Title: An underwater bioluminescence assessment tool (U-BAT) Proposal No.: N054-026-0092 Firm: Western Environmental Tech. Laboratories, Inc. 620 Applegate St. PO Box 518 Philomath, Oregon 97370 Contact: Andrew Barnard Phone: (541) 929-5650 Web Site: www.wetlabs.com Abstract: We propose transition a novel bioluminescence (BL) sensor technology to develop a commercial general purpose bathyphotometer based product for biological assessment of natural waters. This proposal directly addresses ONR topic # N05-T026 for the need to transition new and novel BL sensing technologies from the research to the commercial realm in order to enable a more comprehensive quantification of the spatial and temporal variability of the biogeochemical complexity of coastal oceanic ecosystems. For this purpose, a leading manufacturer of in situ bio-optical instrumentation, WET Labs, has partnered with a renowned group of researchers from the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) to transition in situ bioluminescence (BL) sensing technologies developed at the University into a commercially viable combined bioluminescence and inherent optical properties integrated sensor suite. This Underwater Biological Assessment Tool (U-BAT) will provide unprecedented capabilities for scientists and resource managers to observe and discriminate bulk-phase biological processes in the water column. The envisioned invention will also directly address Naval survey and tactical operations in providing a visibility and vulnerability assessment for deployed assets and potential threats. Benefits: Commercial opportunities for such a device would lie in two primary arenas: Naval applications-The invariable presence of BL from shoreline to deep water often at intensities sufficient to reveal clandestine activities came early to the attention of the US Navy as relevant to the security of its operations and to its detection of opposing forces worldwide (Case et al., 1993). To address the needs of the Navy, the UCSB group developed HIDEX (High Intake Defined Excitation), a large bioluminescence bathyphotometer (BP) with high flow rates (up to44 L s-1) designed to ensure optimal capture efficiency in sparsely populated open ocean regions, and TOWDEX, for high speed surveys at 10 KHz. HIDEX became the NAVO survey standard for oceanic BL measurements (Widder, et al., 1993). While these tools still serve the Navy in an ongoing capacity today they necessarily represent a massive temporal-spatial undersampling in meeting modern Naval objectives for developing a global data base of regional bioluminescence variability. Moreover the first HIDEX generation tools volumetric sampling rates, size, power requirements, and costs make it impractical in consideration of a more ubiquitous tool. Similarly, the beam attenuation tool provides a valuable data product for underwater visibility. The visibility parameter gives information for assessing underwater vulnerability of assets as well as providing truthing information for underwater imaging equipment in order to find optimal ranges and assess viable conditions for optical survey work to continue. When coupled with the BL measurement the resulting sensor allows a rapid tactical assessment tool for many type of Naval operations as well as providing a general survey tool for determining nominal regional variability. Biological monitoring - The opportunity in this proposed effort is to tie the BL measurements together with IOP to provide a new capability for biological monitoring of the oceans. The development of compact optical and BP sensors provides an opportunity to combine the in situ measurements of BL and IOPs for development/advancement of techniques for simultaneous estimates of bioluminescent upwelling radiance (BLw). From the market perspective the combined tool will hold unique advantages. By integrating the BL with IOP measurements potential customers will be provided with a contextual reference point to tie the newer less understood measurement, and will in-effect be gaining value added advantage compared to routine monitoring packages. This in turn will accelerate the acceptance of the BL measurement and ultimately build and define its utility in ocean ecology studies. Return