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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
Coral Sanctuaries in a Warming World?
Climate scientists have predicted that ocean temperatures in the equatorial Pacific will rise significantly by the end of the century, wreaking havoc on coral reef ecosystems. But a new study shows that climate change could cause ocean currents to operate in a surprising way that mitigates the warming near some islands right on the equator. As a result these Pacific islands may become isolated refuges for corals and fish, according to the study by Woods…
To Catch a Hurricane
On Aug. 25, 2011, the line projecting Hurricane Irene’s path up the East Coast barreled smack into Woods Hole, Mass., spurring a whirlwind in Jeff Donnelly’s lab at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI). Scientists and students hustled to create a network of instruments that would capture a hurricane in action. They scurried to get their supplies: 100 bottles of soda pop and a few dozen pairs of ladies’ nylon stockings. Donnelly is a coastal geologist…
Exploring the Arctic in the Midst of Change
Chief Scientist Bob Pickart and his 26-member science team were in the hangar at the Barrow Air Search and Rescue Station, waiting for the helicopter. An Inupiat community barnacled to a rocky beach at the northern tip of the North Slope of Alaska, Barrow is the most practical departure point for research cruises into the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas. But Barrow has no harbor, which is why we needed an airlift to reach the research…
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.