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The Minerals Management Service (MMS) of the U. S. Department of the Interior awarded the contract for the "Deepwater Program: Understanding the Processes that Maintain the Oxygen Levels in the Deep Gulf of Mexico" to the Texas A&M Research Foundation in July 2002. Scientists at Texas A&M University (TAMU) conducted the research. The study area was the deepwater Gulf of Mexico, defined as that part of the Gulf with water depths of 400 m or more. Vertically the study area extended from sea surface to sea floor. Study results will assist MMS in its management of the nation's Outer Continental Shelf Leasing Program, including oil and gas leasing in federal waters of the northern Gulf of Mexico.

"This report covers the data collected as part of the LATEX A moored current meter task (Task A-1). Other data reports cover the other four LATEX A field components (Howard, 1997, for drifters; Jochens et al., 1997, for hydrography; Bender and Kelly, 1996, for ADCP; and Wang et al., 1996, for meteorology). The measurements of surface waves, which are part of the moored current meter task, are presented in DiMarco et al. (1995), DiMarco and Kelly (1995), and DiMarco (1996) and are not discussed in this report. All data have been submitted to the National Oceanographic Data Center (NODC); the LATEX A project number with NODC is 0212"--Introduction.

"The Louisiana-Texas Shelf Physical Oceanography Program (LATEX) was supported by the Minerals Management Service (MMS) of the U.S. Department of the Interior. LATEX was divided into three study units; Study Unit A, Texas-Louisiana Shelf Circulation and Transport Processes Study (LATEX A or LATEX Shelf), was conducted by the Texas A & M University System. The LATEX A field program included current mooring measurements, drifting buoys, hydrography, acoustic Doppler current profiling, and meteorological measurements over the Texas-Louisiana continental shelf from the Mississippi River to the Rio Grande. The field program began in mid-April 1992 and concluded in early December 1994. This report covers the data collected as part of the hydrography field component. This data report consists of the main volume, which describes the surveys and provides information on the methods used for data collection and processing, and ten appendices that present the survey data graphically. The data shown in this report have been submitted in digital form to the National Oceanographic Data Center (NODC), a division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) of the U.S. Department of Commerce; the NODC project number for LATEX A is 0212"--Introduction.