From "CSIRO research for Australia" (1962) pdf pages 16-17:
'In the mid-1950s "A number of small research vessels became available and work on the open sea fisheries was resumed. The scope of the Division's research widened to include some oceanographical topics, and when Dr. G. F. Humphrey succeeded Dr. Thompson in 1956 the Division was renamed "Fisheries and Oceanography".

Oceanographical research received a tremendous fillip in 1959 when the Royal Australian Navy decided to allow two of its frigates to participate in oceanographical research. These two ships, H.M.A.S. "Diamentina" and H.M.A.S. "Gascoyne", have been fitted with laboratories, and their cruises of 40,000 miles per annum are planned with the object of gaining new scientific information in the fields of fisheries, navigation and meteorology.

The results of fisheries and oceanograpbical research are generally unspectacular, but the gradual accumulation of knowledge of the habits and movements of whales, open sea fish, coastal fish, fresh water fish, shell fish and crustaceans has provided a basis for planning the rational utilization of living aquatic resources. Similarly, studies of the temperature, the salinity, the currents and the plankton population of the oceans are building up a clearer picture of the seas from which the fish are harvested."'

Chronology events from "CSIRO at sea" (1988) pages 213-215