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NEWS RELEASES
New program aims to improve hurricane predictions with ocean data
The coordinated combination of in situ observations, satellites, and high-resolution models will allow us to fill gaps in our knowledge of air-sea interactions.
WHOI scientists aim to improve the study of marine heatwaves
Researchers call for regional and context-specific approaches to these extreme events
Coastal retreat in Alaska is accelerating because of compound climate impacts
Observations have shown coastal erosion as an increasing Arctic hazard, but other hazards—including sea level rise and permafrost thaw subsidence—have received less attention.
A new report on coastal resilience
New report released during NY Climate Week and upcoming UN General Assembly high-level plenary meeting on threats posed by sea level rise
Can adding iron to the ocean help it absorb CO2?
A newly published article spells out the work needed to assess the potential of ocean iron fertilization as a low cost, scalable, and rapidly deployable method of mCDR.
WHOI | OCEANUS
The Ocean’s Moveable Feast
Over the past few decades, Carin Ashjian, a biologist at Woods hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), has explored the marine food web and how it has responded to changing ocean conditions. She wants to know how ecosystems are shifting, how species are moving, and how these factors fray or strengthen food webs. Because of warming seas, southern species have found northern waters newly hospitable. Killer whales now show up in Alaskan waters north of the Bering…
Mining climate clues from our whaling past
Climate scientists work with historians to tap weather records from old New England whaling logbooks. They hope to leverage the historical data to gain new insights into modern-day climate conditions.
A ‘Ticking Time Bomb’ in the Arctic
Scientists discover that the amount of heat in a major Arctic Ocean circulation system has doubled over the past 30 years. If the temperatures continue to spike, it could eventually spell trouble for the ice above.
Gliders Reveal Tango Between Hurricanes and the Gulf Stream
Spray gliders cruising the east coast are collecting ocean measurement data that hurricane forecast modelers can use to improve storm intensity forecasts.
Searching for ‘Super Reefs’
Some corals are less vulnerable to ocean acidification. Can the offspring from these more resilient corals travel to other reefs to help sustain more vulnerable coral populations there?
Publications
IN THE NEWS - RESEARCH HIGLIGHTS
Study offers first definitive proof that Gulf Stream has weakened
“New research from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution offers the first conclusive evidence that the Gulf Stream has weakened. The powerful ocean current off the East Coast influences regional weather, climate and fisheries, and the finding could have significant implications both for New England and the global climate.”
What Happens to Marine Life When There Isn’t Enough Oxygen?
In September of 2017, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution postdoctoral scholar Maggie Johnson was conducting an experiment with a colleague in Bocas del Toro off the…
Maine’s having a lobster boom. A bust may be coming.
The waters off Maine’s coast are warming, and no one knows what that’s going to mean for the state’s half-billion-dollar-a-year lobster industry—the largest single-species fishery in North America. Some fear that continued warming could cause the lobster population to collapse. To understand what’s happening to the ecosystem of the Gulf of Maine, says Glen Gawarkiewicz, an oceanographer at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, in Massachusetts, you have to look beyond it—see how it’s affected by the atmosphere, ocean currents, and rivers that flow into it.