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The Ocean Physics Laboratory |
OPL ProjectsMap of OPL Study Sites Our studies primarily utilize advanced instrumentation deployed on moorings. Past and present mooring sites
are shown in the map below. For specific project information, click on project names on the map below. Brief
summaries of select projects are also provided below.
Currently Funded Projects The Bermuda Testbed Mooring project is funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). The BTM is located about 80 km southeast of Bermuda. It has been collecting data at that location since June 1994. The BTM mooring is supported by a 3-m buoy that contains a full suite of meteorological and optical instruments. Subsurface sampling includes currents, temperature, salinity, apparent and inherent optical properties, nutrients, and trace metals. Goals of this project are two-fold: (1) Collect and analyze oceanographic data in an area where measurements have been made since 1950. Using BTM data, we have conducted detailed studies on nutrient fluxes due to eddies, effects of hurricanes on physical and optical properties, ocean color satellite groundtruthing, and theoretical optics. (2) Provide the oceanographic community with a deep-water platform for developing, testing, calibrating, and intercomparing instruments and real-time data telemetry methods. See the BTM Satellite Images page. The RaDyO project is funded by the Office of Naval Research (ONR). Field experiments will be conducted at Scripps Pier (2007), in the Santa Barbara Channel (2008), and off Point Conception (2009). The primary goals of the ONR-sponsored Radiance in a Dynamic Ocean (RaDyO) program are to: (1) Examine time-dependent oceanic radiance distribution in relation to dynamic surface boundary layer (SBL) processes. (2) Construct a radiance-based SBL model. (3) Validate the model with field observations. (4) Investigate the feasibility of inverting the model to yield SBL conditions. The MOSEAN project is funded by the National Oceanographic Partnership Program (NOPP). Co-PIs include Casey Moore (WET Labs, Inc.), Al Hanson (SubChem and U. Rhode Island), and Dave Karl (U. Hawaii). Two moorings are planned for MOSEAN: (1) Coastal mooring in the Santa Barbara Channel in <25 m water depth, and (2) Deep-water mooring off Hawaii near the HOTS site, >4000 m. Scientific goals in the SB Channel include investigation of particulate dynamics through optics, optical detection and characterization of harmful algal blooms, and effects of physical processes on chemical and bio-optical properties. Our technological goals are to develop relatively small, lightweight optical and chemical sensors for autonomous deployment and real-time data telemetry. See the SB Satellite Images and the Hawaii Satellite Images pages. The HI Eddies project is funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). The P.I. of the project is Claudia Benitez-Nelson. Co-P.I.s are Robert Bidigare, Tommy Dickey, Mike Landry, and Carrie Leonard. The goal of HI Eddies is to characterize the physical properties, estimate the primary productivity, quantify new production and export, investigate biomass and grazer influences, and compute growth associated with persistant eddies off Hawaii. Methods include remote sensing; ship-based drifters and transects of profiles (CTD + rosette, optics package); sediment traps; and laboratory experiments. Cruises are scheduled for November 2004, and January and March 2005. See the Hawaii Satellite Images page. The SCCOOS: Shelf to Shoreline Observatory Development project is funded by National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA). Grace Chang is the lead P.I. of the project. Co-PI is Erika McPhee-Shaw (Moss Landing Marine Lab). This project is funded as a subcontract to Scripps Institute of Oceanography as part of a multi-institute collaboration. Our part of the project entails the deployment of a mooring in 80 m water depth in the Santa Barbara Channel for operational oceanography including: monitoring coastal water quality; and observing the evolution of harmful algal blooms, climate variability, and El Niņo/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) related processes. Mooring time series spanning the water column will be able to capture temporal variations to monitor the effects of interannual variation on pollutant delivery, erosion, and re-distribution of sediment and contaminants, and changes in the vertical hydrographic and current structures and their effects on nutrient and particle transport from deep waters to shallow surface waters. High resolution time series measurements telemetered in real-time from moorings can be used by managers and those responsible for the health and well being of the coastal zone. See the Southern California Bight Satellite Images page. Past OPL Projects The Arabian Sea project was funded by the Office of Naval Research (ONR) and the National Science Foundation JGOFS program. A mooring-based time series of physical and bio-optical variables and complementary data were collected during the Arabian Sea Process Study in 1994-1995. The primary goal of this project was to investigate effects of physical processes on primary productivity in the Arabian Sea. The Coastal Mixing and Optics project was funded by the Office of Naval Research (ONR). The CMO mooring site was located about 110 km south of Martha's Vineyard, Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Subsurface sampling included currents, temperature, salinity, apparent and inherent optical properties. The main objective of our research was to determine how particles and optical properties respond to physical forcing under various oceanic conditions on a broad continental shelf off the east coast of the U.S. The Littoral Ocean Observing and Predictive System project was funded through an Office of Naval Research (ONR) subcontract from Harvard University. This project involves partners from academia, government laboratories, and industry for the development of the scientific and technical conceptual basis of a generally applicable interdisciplinary littoral ocean observing system. A modular structural concept for linking, with feedbacks, dynamical models and measurements via data assimilation are being developed, with an emphasis upon adaptive sampling, flexibility and portability. An important aspect of the program is the use of autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs). OPL was funded by the Mamala Bay Study Commission to investigate dilution and dispersion of the Sand Island sewage plume in Mamala Bay, Hawaii. The O-SCOPE project, funded by the National Oceanographic Partnership Program (NOPP), involved academic, government and private laboratories. Project goals were to develop next-generation autonomous real-time interdisciplinary (chemical, bio-optical and physical) long-term time series systems. These systems were deployed on the BTM, NOPP station "P", and the MOOS moorings in Monterey Bay in 1999. The UC Mexus project is a collaboration between University of California schools and investigators in Mexico. Our collaborator is Luis Alvarez of CICESE. The project involved deployment of physical and optical sensors in the Gulf of Mexico to investigate sediment resuspension due to tidal fluxes. HyCODE was an interdisciplinary, multi-institutional project funded by the Office of Naval Research (ONR). Tommy Dickey is the lead P.I. of the project. We utilized a shallow-water mooring off the coast of New Jersey to understand the diverse processes controlling inherent optical properties (IOPs) in the coastal ocean. Specifically, we were investigating effects of river plumes, coastal jets, fronts, and tides on optical properties; groundtruthing of ocean color satellites; optical instrumentation closure; and effects of optical properties on radiant heating rates. OPL was funded through Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute (WHOI) to develop bio-optical instrument systems for JAMSTEC. Our systems have been deployed on two moorings in the Japan Sea for over 400 days continuously without bio-fouling. The bio-optical sensor packages are now being transitioned to the commercial sector. We were working with the Second Institute of Oceanography in Hangzhou, China to develop bio-optical systems for moored deployment.
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