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No Harm, No Foul

August 17, 2016

As long as scientists have been putting instruments in the ocean, biofouling has been a challenge confronting instrument designers. Here, WHOI technician Dan Torres recovers an acoustic doppler current profiler (ADCP) after a two-year deployment more than 1,000 meters beneath the surface. The instrument is part of OSNAP (Overturning in the Subpolar North Atlantic Program), an international effort to create a continuous record of the movement of heat and water from surface to seafloor and from southern Labrador to Scotland. The sub-polar North Atlantic is a crucial part of the planetary climate system, where the ocean releases heat to the atmosphere and cold, dense water sinks to great depth, helping drive global ocean circulation. (Photo by Peigen Lin, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)