Surfing for Science

It's a summer morning at La Jolla Shores and Robert O'Brien, a junior at Princeton University who is spending his summer at UC San Diego, is surfing—for science. He is participating in the Smartfin research project, which aims to improve the collection of oceanographic data near the shore. Smartfin consists of a fin that can be mounted on a surfboard, equipped with temperature and location sensors and a wireless device that transmits the data to the cloud. Researchers are developing algorithms to analyze that data and better understand what is happening to water conditions near shore. Collecting more data is important because there are very few existing tools to gather this information in the tumultuous area where waves break. Smartfin is the brainchild of Andy Stern, who encouraged researchers at Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the Jacobs School of Engineering to take on the project through a generous donation to UC San Diego through his Lost Bird Foundation. Philip Bresnahan, an alumnus of Scripps who is now a professor at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, leads the project.