How to measure the vertical structure of the ocean
Understanding the three-dimensional nature of the ocean is becoming a critical focal point of ocean research, but it can be a costly affair. Paired with Nortek current profilers, Del Mar Oceanographic’s Wirewalker is giving researchers from around the globe a cost-effective way to answer vital questions surrounding the functioning of ocean processes. This information helps improve environmental monitoring and climate forecasting, which in turn assists with adaptation and mitigation decision-making.
Information on the three-dimensional structure of the ocean is proving increasingly vital for multiple research projects. These include characterising the ocean mixed layers for improving weather and climate forecasting, monitoring environmental conditions, and exploring co-located measurements of physical and biological variability to unravel the links between physical processes and productivity.
In coastal waters, physical and biological measurements are often taken from a single instrument attached to a permanent structure such as a pier, or from a series of instruments distributed along the length of a mooring. “The former doesn’t provide information regarding the vertical ocean structure, which is all-important. The latter is expensive, especially if many types of measurements are to be collected,” Dr Drew J. Lucas, Assistant Professor at Scripps Institution of Oceanography/Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at UC San Diego, and co-founder of Del Mar Oceanographic explained.
Further offshore, costs continue to mount. Here, instruments are lowered down and pulled up through the water column by diesel-powered winches on a ship.
Together with Dr Robert Pinkel, Distinguished Professor (Emeritus) at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography and co-founder of Del Mar Oceanographic, Lucas has developed a cost-effective and easy to use mechanism for gathering such two-dimensional data – the Wirewalker, a platform that can safely move instruments throughout the water column to collect data. “The challenge is to ‘see’ enough of the ocean in a single experiment that we can figure out how it ‘works’,” Pinkel said…
Read the story in full at Nortek.
