Categories
Marine Studies Initiative

Ocean Views

Technology extends our vision. We’ve always known that the ocean is a dynamic environment, but satellite-borne sensors, sonar, time-lapse video, moored buoys and autonomous gliders are revealing new details: fish, squid and whales in unexpected places; rumblings that foretell the creation of the seafloor; wind-driven surface currents; nitrogen-fixing microbes; circulating rings of water; shifting concentrations of chlorophyll that may signal plankton blooms.

Categories
Earth Healthy Planet Marine Studies Initiative

Winter Storms Lead to Spring Bloom

If you separate predators from their prey, you get more prey. Now that simple relationship has been used to explain one of the most important annual events in the ocean: the North Atlantic spring phytoplankton bloom.