Ocean science news, explainers, and statistics covering marine environments, currents, climate, coasts, seafloor research, and the changing global ocean.
The photic zone is the part of a body of water that receives sunlight. The aphotic zone lies below the reach of useful sunlight and remains dark apart from bioluminescence. Their boundary is governed by light, not by one universal depth, so it shifts with water clarity, season and the amount of light at the…
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What people carry away from the ocean often sounds bigger than a day at the shore. In a national qualitative study, many respondents described the sea as a place where daily pressure eased, family bonds grew stronger, living creatures felt vividly present and responsibility toward the marine world became easier to feel in ordinary life.…
A turbidity current is a sediment-laden flow that moves downslope through a lake or ocean because it is denser than the clearer water around it. It behaves like an underwater avalanche, eroding the bed, carrying sediment through submarine canyons and depositing layered fans across deeper terrain. Earthquakes can trigger turbidity currents, but they are not…
Scientists measure ocean currents with mechanical and electronic current meters, drifting buoys, ship surveys, moorings, satellites and autonomous vehicles. One of the most versatile tools is the acoustic Doppler current profiler, or ADCP, which uses sound to measure water velocity at many depths at once. No single instrument captures every current. A mooring records change…
