Wendy Laursen
Contributing Writer-
Ice “Memory” to be Protected in Antarctica
The Ice Memory Foundation is preparing for the upcoming transport of ice cores from mountain glaciers to the Ice Memory Sanctuary in Antarctica.The announcement was made as part of the launch of the UN Decade of Action for Cryospheric Sciences (2025-2034) during the third UN Ocean Conference in Nice on June 8.Preserved in the Ice Memory Sanctuary at Concordia Station, the cores will be available for…
-
Upscaling Power Subsea: Cables and Connectors
Cable and connector manufacturers are rushing to meet the growing demand for subsea cables and connectors as renewables upscale, but whether it’s renewables or oil and gas, there’s also growing demand for high-tech subsea communications.The export cables that bring offshore wind power to shore are already so massive that one meter of cable can weigh 300kg. Nexans had previously upscaled its production facilities to cater for increasing demand…
-
An Unintentional Iron Fertilization Experiment
The idea of fertilizing the ocean with iron, an element essential for the growth of phytoplankton, is being considered as a climate change mitigation measure - when they die, phytoplankton take carbon into the deep ocean.However, concerns have been raised about large scale intentional iron fertilization that may limit its effectiveness as a carbon dioxide removal strategy. A major one is nutrient robbing…
-
The Soundscape Code
Damselfish can make pops, clicks and chirps by grinding their teeth. When seeking a mate, some can make more high-pitched sounds.Another coral reef dweller, the snapping shrimp, makes a sound with its large claw to stun its prey or deter predators. A cavitation bubble is formed when the claw opens and closes rapidly, and the sound is produced when the bubble collapses.It’s sounds like these that can be used as a proxy measure for reef health.
-
Artificial Reef or Ecological Trap
There’s not a lot of data on the underwater ecosystems developing on and under floating wind structures; there’s just not that many of these farms installed yet.A recent study by researchers in Scottish set out to analyze what data there is and to hypothesize about what the potential positive and negative effects might be for marine life.It’s potentially important because floating offshore wind is being developed on highly productive shelf seas.
-
Fugro’s Blue Eclipse® USV Makes Commercial Debut
This week, Fugro announced the first commercial contract for its Blue Eclipse® uncrewed surface vessel (USV).For the first time in its history, Norway’s MAREANO will use USV technology to acquire seabed mapping data for the Norwegian Hydrographic Service.The Blue Eclipse®, the largest USV in Fugro’s fleet, will survey over 675 square kilometers in the North Sea, with water depths ranging from 90 to 250 meters.Equipped with advanced high-resolution…
-
Naturally Quiet
The Arctic’s bowhead whales can live for over 200 years. Imagine what they might hear in that time: screw propellers were only just being used to power ships 200 years ago, and diesel engines appeared some hundred years after that.The underwater radiated noise of shipping has grown globally, but the Arctic is a special place. It has been partially shielded from shipping noise. Sea ice shields and diffuses underwater sound…
-
Quantum Sensing Beats GPS-Denied Navigational Challenges
The same error-prone sensitivity that has slowed down the development of quantum computers is being turned into an advantage for GPS-denied navigation.A new quantum sensing technology from Australia-based Q-CTRL has most recently caught the interest of Lockheed Martin and the US Defense Innovation Unit, but the company is already working with the Australian Department of Defence, the UK Royal Navy…
-
Machine Learning Versus Statistics
A study published last week used a wave flume to evaluate the effects of waves on small-diameter pipelines. The experimental data was interpreted statistically and using machine learning.The difference between the two is fundamental.As a University of North Dakota blog pointed out recently: In statistics, the main objective is to understand relationships between variables, make predictions, test scientific hypotheses and provide explanations based on data.
-
The Biggest Conservation Commitment in the World
At COP 15 in December 2022, over 190 countries adopted a framework for action in support of the Convention on Biological Diversity.The framework includes 23 targets aimed at reversing habitat and species loss. Target 3, known as “30x30”, calls for the effective protection and management of 30% of the world’s terrestrial, inland water and coastal and marine areas by the year 2030.Put simply, says the Nature Conservancy…
-
A New Approach to Studying the Air-Sea Flux
A group of over 50 researchers have made the case for a new permanent unmanned surface vessel (USV) network to complement the mature and emerging networks within the Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS).They have drawn up a blueprint for guiding the global USV community towards an integrated approach to a key ocean observing frontier: the air-sea flux (the interface between the ocean and the atmosphere).Here…
-
Whale Song
Who is listening to whale song? Quite a lot of people it turns out, and those who are filtering it out of their data are missing an opportunity for greater understanding of humans, whales and oceans.Earlier this year, a group of linguists, developmental scientists, marine biologists and behavioral ecologists from Griffith University in Australia considered how human babies discover words in speech…
-
Subsea Inspection’s New Boss
IBM recently explained why AI orchestration is important: As AI systems grow more advanced, a single AI model or agent can be insufficient for handling complex tasks. Autonomous systems frequently struggle to collaborate because they are built across multiple clouds and applications, leading to siloed operations and inefficiencies.AI agent orchestration bridges these gaps, enabling multiple AI agents…
-
Ocean Acidification: Warming’s “Evil Twin”
This week Sonardyne announced the integration of its CONTROS HydroC dissolved CO2 sensor from -4H-JENA engineering into its Origin 600 Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler, a development aimed at unlocking new capabilities for ocean acidification research.The combined solution enables precise, real-time monitoring of dissolved carbon dioxide levels alongside detailed current profiling.The oceans act as a partial sink for atmospheric CO2…
-
Writing is Thinking
This week, researchers at the University of Florida found that while AI can be a valuable assistant, it falls short of replacing human scientists in many critical areas.The researchers tested how well popular generative AI models including OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Microsoft’s Copilot and Google’s Gemini could handle various stages of the research process. They put these AI systems through six stages of academic research – ideation…
-
Grander Canyons
There are subsea canyons far bigger than the Grand Canyon.The Grand Canyon is 6,093 feet (1,857 meters) deep, but the Zhemchug Canyon, located in the middle of the Bering Sea, is 8,530 feet (2,600 meters) deep.The Grand Canyon is 277 miles (446 kilometers) long, but the Kroenke Canyon in the western Pacific Ocean is 480 miles (700 kilometers) long. It is the longest and the most voluminous submarine canyon yet discovered.There are around 10…
-
A Graveyard for Glaciers
Last year, headstones carved from ice by Icelandic sculptor Ottó Magnússon were placed in a windswept field by the sea to create, before they melted away, a Glacier Graveyard. The headstones bore the names of glaciers from around the world that are lost or waning due to global warming.Among them were:• Pico Humboldt, the last of Venezuela's glaciers, now gone• Anderson Glacier, in Washington U.S., disappeared in 2011• Kilimanjaro…
-
The Future of Coral Reef Protection
The future of coral reef protection lies at the intersection of technology and collaboration, say Australian researchers who are designing a global real-time monitoring system.They hope to help save the world’s coral reefs from further decline, primarily caused by bleaching as a result of global warming. In the past two years, 75% of coral reefs worldwide have experienced bleaching-level heat stress.A…
-
The Prolonged Impact of UXO
In 1946, the Polish cargo ship SS Kielce, loaded with munitions, sank about four miles off the coast of England. Its attempted salvage in 1967 resulted in an explosion equivalent to an earthquake measuring 4.5 on the Richter scale.Nobody was injured that time, but others haven’t been so lucky. Over 110 people have died from unexploded ordinance (UXO) dumped in the North Sea since 1945.A study reported in Marine Technology News this week investigated another risk such munitions pose.
-
A New Thriller About an Amazing Rescue
In the early days of dynamic positioning, the 1960s and 70s, commercial deepsea divers soon learned how good their support vessel’s DP footprint was. Their lives depended on it. If a vessel slowly, or worse still, rapidly, moved off position, they would be pulled along with it.Diver safety was an early motivator for developments in DP systems, but risks remained. Chris Lemons survived a worst-case scenario in the North Sea in 2012: “First, the communications cable snapped.
- 1
- 2
February 2025
