Australian Membership of the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program

This is a proposal for a 5-year membership of the international Integrated Ocean Drilling Program. The key aims of the Program are to understand the deep biosphere and sub-seafloor ocean, environmental and climate change, processes and effects, and solid Earth cycles and geodynamics. The Program addresses fundamental science issues by sampling sediment sequences and basement crust of the ocean basins and continental margins to enable a wide range of frontier geoscientific, paleoclimatological, paleoceanographic, and biotechnological research of ultimate benefit and significance to the energy and mineral resources industries, and to our national welfare.