At-sea testing and final development of the Hadal Water Column Profiler

深渊水柱剖面仪的海上测试和最终开发

• 批准号: 2221749
• 负责人: Glenn Carter
• 金额: $ 19.98万
• 依托单位: University of Hawaii
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2022-09-01 至 2025-02-28
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2221749&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: sea; testing; final; development; Hadal

Very little is known about the mixing, circulation, chemical properties, and biological communities in the hadal water column, i.e., waters deeper than 6500 m. The handful of measurements that have been made show that rather than being quiescent and isolated from the ocean above, the water in the hadal zone is renewed on surprisingly short time scales. More multidisciplinary observations are needed to advance hadal water column science. To that end the researchers, using private foundation money, developed a 11 km depth rated (capable of getting to the deepest point in the ocean) Hadal Water Column Profiler which allows repeated vertical profiles of temperature, conductivity, dissolved oxygen, turbulent mixing, current velocity, acoustic backscatter, and video, and it has a small 11-bottle water sampler. The researchers conducted two days of at-sea testing which showed that the development had successfully produced a functioning profiler, but also that more at-sea testing is needed for the Hadal Water Column Profiler to reach its potential as a cutting-edge scientific instrument ready for oceanographic research expeditions. Once operational the Hadal Water Column Profiler will provide the means to substantially increase understanding of one of the most undersampled regions in the global ocean. It will enable the first direct measurements of turbulent mixing in the deep ocean trenches, allow for exploration of flow, trench ventilation mechanisms, and midwater biological communities shedding light on biological connectivity, and enable the identification of nepheloid layers created by turbidity flows that are likely common and important biogeochemically and biologically in trenches.This project will provide additional ship time for the final development of this unique instrument. During three 4-day periods of at-sea testing, the researchers will undertake six tasks identified from the prior at-sea testing. These tasks include optimizing the ‘flight’ characteristics for data quality and using contemporaneous traditional Conductivity-Temperature-Depth and Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler measurements to evaluate the data. During the previous at-sea testing a half size prototype water sampler was used. This project will allow a full-size water sampler to be tested. Finally, due to the unique capabilities of the Hadal Water Column Profiler, both in terms of depth rating and suite of sensors, future research expeditions are likely to rely heavily on this instrument so it is important to build up a documented history of performance in terms of reliability, data quality, and operational efficiency.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

人们对深渊水柱（即深度超过 6500 米的水域）的混合、循环、化学性质和生物群落知之甚少。一些测量表明，深渊水柱并不是静止的并且与上方的海洋隔离。 ，超深渊区域的水在令人惊讶的短时间内更新，需要更多的多学科观测来推进超深渊水柱科学，为此，研究人员利用私人基金会的资金，开发了 11 公里的额定深度。研究人员进行了深渊水柱剖面分析仪，它可以重复显示温度、电导率、溶解氧、湍流混合、水流速度、声学反向散射和视频的垂直剖面图，并且它有一个小型的 11 瓶水采样器。两天的海上测试表明，该开发已成功生产出功能齐全的剖面仪，但深渊水柱剖面仪还需要进行更多的海上测试，以发挥其作为尖端科学仪器的潜力一旦投入使用，深渊水柱剖面仪将提供大幅增加对全球海洋中采样最不足的区域之一的了解的方法，它将能够首次直接测量深海海沟中的湍流混合。对水流、沟渠通风机制和中水生物群落的探索揭示了生物连通性，并能够识别由浊流形成的浊流层，这些浊流层在生物地球化学和生物学上可能是常见且重要的该项目将为这种独特仪器的最终开发提供额外的船舶时间，在三个为期 4 天的海上测试期间，研究人员将承担之前海上测试中确定的六项任务。在之前的海上测试中，使用了半尺寸原型水采样器来评估数据质量，并使用同时进行的传统电导率-温度-深度和声学多普勒电流剖面仪测量。最后，由于深渊水柱剖面仪在深度等级和传感器套件方面的独特功能，未来的研究探险可能会严重依赖该仪器，因此该项目将允许测试全尺寸的水采样器。在可靠性、数据质量和运营效率方面建立记录的绩效历史非常重要。该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优点和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。