exploration at sea

A fundamental prerequisite for ocean acidification work is to accurately measure seawater pH and carbon chemistry. The basic objective of ocean acidification research is to work out the impact of inputting extra carbon dioxide into seawater.

We are now in weather area Rockall, to the west of Ireland. Today has been a gruelling day because, in addition to normal tasks, we also started analysing some of the water we have been carrying with us since Scotland.

As promised yesterday, today’s entry focuses on cold-water corals and is written by Laura Wicks and Sebastian Hennige, who, together with Murray Roberts (all from Heriot-Watt University), are carrying out the work.

The Shipping Forecast Cruise?

We are almost getting into a routine now as we get through the second cruise day, settle into our scientific nests, complete our fourth CTD station, start preparations for the first deck incubation experiment, and converge on Mingulay for the deep-sea coral reef collection.

Today we left the dock in Liverpool quite early, at about 8:30. We were delayed slightly as waited to exit through a tidal lock. Then we were on our way, out into the turbid, brown-coloured waters of Liverpool Bay where we carried out our first CTD station at about midday.

On the 6 June 2011, the UK research vessel the RRS Discovery left Liverpool docks to embark on the first research cruise in a large UK programme studying the impacts of ocean acidification.

On the cruise, researchers are investigating the impacts of changing seawater chemistry on: