Chasing ocean carbon – from Sky to Sea and below
The transport of organic carbon from the surface of the ocean to its depths plays a central role in regulating atmospheric carbon, and thus the world’s climate. In many ways, the pathway that carbon will take is dictated by type of microscopic algae – phytoplankton – present in the sunlit portion of the ocean. Hence, if we were able to continuously see the diversity of the oceanic phytoplankton and have a better understanding of the complexity of biologically driven carbon flux, we would be able to monitor and predict changes to the ocean carbon cycle on human-kind relevant timescales.
For this talk, I will tell you how we do exactly that: chase the oceanic carbon from sky to sea (NASA PACE mission), and below (EXPORTS, Sea2Sky), all thanks to the amazing, and sometimes quirky, technology.