A New OBCS: Ocean Bottom Cabled Seismometer - IP Goes to the Oceans

An ocean bottom cabled seismometer (OBCS) is the best solution for the monitoring of earthquake activity in a seismogenic zone where big or huge earthquakes have occurred repeatedly. However, the number of existing OBCS has been insufficient for high resolution observation of the seismogenic zone, due to the high costs involved. In order to lower the cost of OBCS and to meet requirements for flexibility and expandability of measurements, the latest Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and JP (Internet Protocol) are adopted for use at the ocean bottom. This paper presents the objectives, architecture and system design, and the newly developed prototype of an OBCS.