PI: Uwe Send
CONTACT INFORMATION:
Research Institution: Scripps Institution of Oceanography
PI First name, Last name: Uwe Send
Phone:
Email: usend@ucsd.edu
Project website link: http://mooring.ucsd.edu
PROJECT DESCRIPTION:
My “Ocean Time Series Group” group at SIO specializes on research and technology that involves the collection and analysis of sustained and rapidly sampling autonomous observations, mostly using mooring techniques. Our own expertise is mainly physical oceanography, but strong collaborations with colleagues within and outside SIO enable us to collect moored data with biogeochemical and ecosystem sensors as well. We have spent a lot of effort to enable real-time telemetry from any instruments anywhere in our moorings, using inductive and acoustic technology, and using gliders as “data shuttles” with acoustic modems. Both the mechanical design and the electronics for data collection and telemetry of our moorings are designed to be modular and flexible, allowing easy accommodation and integration of sensors from other collaborators. Our projects and real-time data can be viewed at the website given above.
For ocean acidification, our lab operates three moorings that contribute observations in the California Current regime. The longest timeseries exists at Del Mar, just north of San Diego, on the continental shelf on the 100m isobath. We now have 5 years of continuous data throughout the water column of T, S, currents, and oxygen/chlorophyll at 2-3 depths. Near-bottom oxygen observations were started in November 2009, and in June 2011 near-bottom pH was added in collaboration with T.Martz. All data are received in real-time, and now reveal near-bottom hypoxia events in each year. In the California Current (off the continental shelf) we have two NOAA-funded highly multidisciplinary moorings (co-PI M.Ohman, collaborators T.Martz, C.Sabine, R.Feely, D.Demer, A.Dickson, L.Washburn, J.Hildebrand) off Pt. Conception (CalCOFI line 80) on the 800m isobath (upwelling regime) and in the southward low-salinity core of the California Current (open-ocean regime). These moorings observe, also in real-time, surface pCO2 and pH, and oxygen, pH, nutrients, chlorophyll fluorescence at several depths, acoustic backscatter for zooplankton/fish abundance over 0-300m, in addition to T, S, and currents.
Uwe Send is also a co-chair for the international OceanSITES program, which is implementing a global open-ocean timeseries observing system, part of the official Global Ocean Observing System (and JCOMM, etc). OceanSITES has a strong biogeochemical component, and members such A.Dickson, D.Wallace, F.Chavez represent this community. Both a Scientific Steering Team and a Data Management Team exist, and the data management effort (lead by NOAA NDBC) now appears to be the most advanced among such oceanographic programs. The global ocean acidification observing network advocated and planned by R.Feely (see the OceanObs09 papers about this), maps onto and is coordinated with OceanSITES for the open-ocean sites. Discussions are underway to explore whether OceanSITES can also assist with the coastal component of this.