Nature creates its own density column in marine systems, which is extremely important for the triggering of the spring bloom of phytoplankton. Phytoplankton are an important food source for all organisms- from microscopic zooplankton to large marine mammals such as walrus and whales. The different salinities (and therefore, different densities) of water help to stabilize the water column (by limiting
IPY marks the beginning of a sustained effort to understand large-scale environmental change in Earth's polar regions, which have major societal and economic impacts, and to advance new scientific frontiers, from the molecular to the planetary scale. NASA brings a unique perspective to IPY, which will focus on five themes: 1) NASA explores scientific frontiers in Earth's polar regions.; 2)
WHOI is the world's largest private, nonprofit ocean research, engineering and education organization. This site has information on oceans from climate to ocean life to ships and technology.
ALISON combines educational and scientific need by
1. supporting teacher professional development and student learning in the local context through the study of those abundant and familiar materials, snow and ice, that
2. creates scientifically valuable data that document the lake ice and conductive heat flow variability in Alaska, and which can be used for evaluating the performance of numerical