Hurricanes mix the deep layers of the ocean, bringing nutrients and low oxygen zones to the surface, study the findings

With careful planning and some luck, the researchers discovered the surprising progress of the hurricane after the category 4 storm disrupted their expedition near the Mexico coast.

The team managed to sample the ocean immediately after the storm passed and revealed that storms so strongly and deeply blow the ocean-do thousands of meters-which are nutrients, rich in nutrients, cold water It is brought to the surface.

Resulting phytoplancon blooms – visible in satellite images Downloaded from space-hostees are bacteria, zooplankton, small fish and animals that feed on a filter like shells and bald whales.

“When we got there, you could actually see and feel the difference in the ocean,” said Professor Michael Beman. “It was green of all the ch

But all this mixing also mixes the low oxygen zone deep in the water, bringing them much closer to the surface than usual, threatening organisms that need more oxygen concentrations to survive.

Beman, a sea ​​biologistStudies of microbial ecology and biogeochemistry. One of his focus is the minimum ocean oxygen zones (OMZ), large and globally significant areas with little and without oxygen. They are permanent layers in a water column that have a low oxygen concentration due to biological, chemical and physical processes. OMZ appears naturally, unlike similar “dead zones” that pollution can produce.

OMZ is usually found in medium depths and can significantly affect sea ​​ecosystems such as uncomfortable with many organisms. Heating ocean waters contributes to the spread of OMZ.

2018, Beman and his laboratory went to a Research expedition From Mazatlán in Mexico, to San Diego, to the study of OMZ SCRIPPS Institution of Oceanography in UC San Diego, the Oceanographic institution Woods Hole and several other institutions.

They knew that the tumultuous weather was probably very closely watching the other named Storm of the Year, Hurricane Bud, pulled into their planned sampling region.

“We were very careful and we had plans A, B, C and D in place,” he said. “The prognosis was extremely accurate and we knew the storm quickly reinforced.”

Instead of going to the shore, they traveled between research sites and behind the island as they waited for a storm to pass.

“There were skills involved, but it’s definitely a little luck, and in the end we added a sampling site where the storm was the maximum power,” Beman said, “basically a few kilometers from the former eye.”

These samples are rarely, if ever, take only after a Hurricane The water knocked so hard. The data showed that a hurricane dramatically changed oxygen concentrations.

“I have never seen such measurements in the ocean areas,” Berman said.

From traveling, researchers examine different aspects of results and new work in Progress of scienceThe magazine published by the American Association for Progress Science describes in detail their discovery.

Beman collaborated on an expedition with Professor Scripps Geosciences Lihini Aluwihare and two of his students, Margot White and Irina Koester.

“Margot noticed changes in the underworld from Hurricane when she was preparing chapters on thesis, especially the fact that the minimum oxygen zone extinguished rapidly,” he said. “Irina searched her unique organic matter data to look for changes in the guided hurricane, which proved to be very clear and dramatic.

“We have met a lot, many times to analyze the data and understand what effects of Hurricane has and why.”

The samples also included DNA and RNA, so researchers could discover the signatures of organisms that responded to the flowering of phytoplacton. Beman said they saw many turtles, which was unusual because they were on offshore.

“We did this at the time of the year when these parts of the ocean would not happen much about biological,” he said, “so these flowers were generated by hurricanes like ocean organisms. We discovered bacterial flowering, but would not be surprised if larger organisms used hurricanes. storm He just crossed. “

Their samples and data are so unique that Beman plans to continue working on them and hopes to cooperate with other scientists interested in the effects of the hurricane and the Prognosis of the Hurricane.

“We’re just scratching the surface of what these storms do, and there were about a few days at sea,” he said. “I hope that we will continue to learn how much we can do about what is actually happening during and after a hurricane.”