Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

About: Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution is a nonprofit organization based out in Falmouth, Massachusetts, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Mantle (geology). The organization has 5685 authors who have published 18396 publications receiving 1202050 citations. The organization is also known as: WHOI.

Trajectory shifts in the Arctic and subarctic freshwater cycle.

Abstract: Manifold changes in the freshwater cycle of high-latitude lands and oceans have been reported in the past few years. A synthesis of these changes in freshwater sources and in ocean freshwater storage illustrates the complementary and synoptic temporal pattern and magnitude of these changes over the past 50 years. Increasing river discharge anomalies and excess net precipitation on the ocean contributed approximately 20,000 cubic kilometers of fresh water to the Arctic and high-latitude North Atlantic oceans from lows in the 1960s to highs in the 1990s. Sea ice attrition provided another approximately 15,000 cubic kilometers, and glacial melt added approximately 2000 cubic kilometers. The sum of anomalous inputs from these freshwater sources matched the amount and rate at which fresh water accumulated in the North Atlantic during much of the period from 1965 through 1995. The changes in freshwater inputs and ocean storage occurred in conjunction with the amplifying North Atlantic Oscillation and rising air temperatures. Fresh water may now be accumulating in the Arctic Ocean and will likely be exported southward if and when the North Atlantic Oscillation enters into a new high phase.

Sulfolipids dramatically decrease phosphorus demand by picocyanobacteria in oligotrophic marine environments.

Abstract: There is growing evidence that dissolved phosphorus can regulate planktonic production in the oceans’ subtropical gyres, yet there is little quantitative information about the biochemical fate of phosphorus in planktonic communities. We observed in the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre (NPSG) that the synthesis of membrane lipids accounted for 18–28% of the phosphate (PO4 3−) taken up by the total planktonic community. Paradoxically, Prochlorococcus, the cyanobacterium that dominates NPSG phytoplankton, primarily synthesizes sulfoquinovosyldiacylglycerol (SQDG), a lipid that contains sulfur and sugar instead of phosphate. In axenic cultures of Prochlorococcus, it was observed that <1% of the total PO4 3− uptake was incorporated into membrane lipids. Liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry of planktonic lipids in the NPSG confirmed that SQDG was the dominant membrane lipid. Furthermore, the analyses of SQDG synthesis genes from the Sargasso Sea environmental genome showed that the use of sulfolipids in subtropical gyres was confined primarily to picocyanobacteria; no sequences related to known heterotrophic bacterial SQDG lineages were found. This biochemical adaptation by Prochlorococcus must be a significant benefit to these organisms, which compete against phospholipid-rich heterotrophic bacteria for PO4 3−. Thus, evolution of this “sulfur-for-phosphorus” strategy set the stage for the success of picocyanobacteria in oligotrophic environments and may have been a major event in Earth’s early history when the relative availability of sulfate and PO4 3− were significantly different from today’s ocean. bacteria cyanobacteria genomics lipids marine phosphorus cycle

Global Patterns of Diapycnal Mixing from Measurements of the Turbulent Dissipation Rate

Abstract: The authors present inferences of diapycnal diffusivity from a compilation of over 5200 microstructure profiles. As microstructure observations are sparse, these are supplemented with indirect measurements of mixingobtainedfrom(i)Thorpe-scaleoverturnsfrommooredprofilers,afinescaleparameterizationappliedto (ii) shipboard observations of upper-ocean shear, (iii) strain as measured by profiling floats, and (iv) shear and strainfromfull-depthloweredacousticDoppler currentprofilers (LADCP)andCTDprofiles. Verticalprofiles of the turbulent dissipation rate are bottom enhanced over rough topography and abrupt, isolated ridges. The geography of depth-integrated dissipation rate shows spatial variability related to internal wave generation, suggesting one direct energy pathway to turbulence. The global-averaged diapycnal diffusivity below 1000-m depth is O(10 24 )m 2 s 21 and above 1000-m depth is O(10 25 )m 2 s 21 . The compiled microstructure observations sample a wide range of internal wave power inputs and topographic roughness, providing a dataset with which to estimate a representative global-averaged dissipation rate and diffusivity. However, there is strong regional variabilityin theratiobetweenlocal internalwavegeneration and local dissipation.Insomeregions,the depthintegrateddissipationrateiscomparabletotheestimatedpowerinputintothelocalinternalwavefield.Inafew cases, more internal wave power is dissipated than locally generated, suggesting remote internal wave sources. However,atmostlocationsthetotalpowerlostthroughturbulentdissipationislessthantheinputintothelocal internal wave field. This suggests dissipation elsewhere, such as continental margins.