Related topics: ocean · climate change

Climate-change-driven cold snaps threaten marine life

Tropical marine species venturing into new areas as the climate changes could fall victim to another effect of the phenomenon—as bursts of cold water from the deep sea suddenly kill them.

Verifying the mathematics behind ocean modeling

Global climate models, such as the Energy Exascale Earth System Model developed by the U.S. Department of Energy, rely on many underlying equations that simulate Earth's natural processes. These include the water cycle, carbon ...

How whales struggle to navigate in a sea of noise pollution

In 1490, Leonardo da Vinci wrote, "If you cause your ship to stop and place the head of a long tube in the water and place the outer extremity to your ear, you will hear ships at a great distance from you."

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Ocean current

An ocean current is a continuous, directed movement of ocean water generated by the forces acting upon the water, such as the Earth's rotation, wind, temperature, salinity differences and tides caused by the gravitational pull of the Moon and the Sun. Depth contours, shoreline configurations and interaction with other currents influence a current's direction and strength.

Ocean currents can flow for thousands of kilometers, and together they create the great flow of the global conveyor belt which plays a dominant part in determining the climate of many of the Earth’s regions. Perhaps the most striking example is the Gulf Stream, which makes northwest Europe much more temperate than any other region at the same latitude. Another example is the Hawaiian Islands, where the climate is cooler (sub-tropical) than the tropical latitudes in which they are located, because of the effect of the California Current.

This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA