Ominous clouds form in the distance. The sunny sky slowly turns grey. There is a sweet smell of fresh rain on hot pavement. Then the downpour ensues. ddddled under a small overhang are 11 ecologists trying to stay dry while the storm subsides so they can board their boat for Pongara National Park. Pongara is […]
The CYGNSS constellation was launched on 15 Dec 2016 and the eight spacecraft have been going through engineering commissioning, in which each of their subsystems is tested and adjusted for best performance. One important milestone was reached on 4 Jan 2017 when we made our “first light” science measurements. This happened the first time we […]
Plankton comes from the greek word planktos, meaning wanderer. It does not define a specific organism, but rather a specific life style. Plankton consist of all organisms dispersed in water that are passively driven by water currents or are subject to passive sinking process. Some of those organisms have an ability to produce oxygen and sugars using sunlight […]
The sediment traps and the Wirewalker were recovered after three days of collecting data with a big surprise. Some parts were bent, and three out of the four collecting cylinders of the sediment traps were missing. The remaining trap was broken and unusable. One battery pack was lost, another damaged and the bungee had snapped. “What if we are not prepared […]
Earth’s ocean is vast and deep, and we still need to study many things about it. To investigate and quantify biological and chemical processes, for instance, we need to determine the concentration and size of particles (living and non-living organisms) floating in the water, dissolved materials, and the diversity of organisms such as the microscopic […]
I always knew that one day I wanted to study the ocean, even though I grew up just north of Pittsburgh and had never seen the ocean. After graduating high school, I attended the College of Charleston in South Carolina where my plan from the start was to major in Marine Biology. I began my […]
Melissa Omand, interdisciplinary physical oceanographer from the University of Rhode Island’s Graduate School of Oceanography, was confronted with a conflict: it was time for an upgrade to her phone, but creating more technological trash did not feel right. Plus, the camera on her older phone was fantastic. Together with her first graduate student Noah Walcutt, she worked on optimizing […]
Trying to sleep on a trampoline while somebody is jumping on it – this is how it feels during many nights at sea as the ship zig-zags in an imaginary box around our drifting instruments in the North Pacific during winter. This is when biological activity is lowest, but clearly there is no absence of physical […]
Act 1: Blowin’ in the wind At the unholy hour of 0400, I find myself on the aft deck of the world-class research vessel Falkor, bubbling with excitement stemming from a unique combination of four shots of espresso, generally being a morning person, and, most importantly, preparing to test an experimental device that I have put […]
