Marine sciences must cast off an imperial legacy of ocean exploitation

A century and a half after HMS Challenger launched into the primary international survey of the ocean, some concepts from the period nonetheless linger. They urgently must be left behind, says Helen Scales

By Helen Scales

ON 21 DECEMBER 1872, the transformed warship HMS Challenger embarked from Portsmouth, England, on the primary ever international scientific survey of the seas. Researchers from the Royal Society of London borrowed the vessel from the Royal Navy for a four-year, 130,000-kilometre voyage, which introduced into focus the really colossal scale of the worldwide ocean and revealed vivid particulars of its residing inhabitants.

Now, 150 years later, the Challenger expedition stays a milestone in oceanography. Scientists nonetheless use its huge collections of marine organisms, together with to review how the ocean is altering. Of course, a lot has altered for the reason that Challenger …