Cooperative research ventures between some new ones, such as a telemetering pin oceanographic institutions and nations to ger for getting a continuous temperature day frequently start with a series of official profile and a thermoprobe accurate to meetings, councils, and so forth, followed 0.005°C. by several years of research, and finally a When the R.V. CHAIN returned home, group of papers ernerging in various techni there were requests from many laboratories cal journals. The study of the Red Sea is an around the world for sediment samples to exception to this procedure. It is a good analyze. These requests were filled insofar example of the kind of spontaneous cooper as was possible without exhausting all avail ation that can occur when individual scien able sample. tists get excited about a unique problern and Although the hot brine and heavy metal work together exchanging samples and data deposits cover an area of less than 100 and publishing their final results in a single square miles, they are clearly part of a volume. The problern ofthe hot holes ofthe larger geological scheme. The world-wide Red Sea required real teamwork from scien interest in rift valleys and sea floor spread tists of many different disciplines as well as ing with their attendant hydrothermal and different nationalities.