News tagged with ocean currents
Heavy ice could delay start of Shell Alaska's Arctic drilling
The heaviest polar ice in more than a decade could postpone the start of offshore oil drilling in the Arctic Ocean until the beginning of August, a delay of up to two weeks, Shell Alaska officials said.
May 28, 2012 |
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Radioactive bluefin tuna crossed the Pacific to US
Across the vast Pacific, the mighty bluefin tuna carried radioactive contamination that leaked from Japan's crippled nuclear plant to the shores of the United States 6,000 miles away - the first time a huge ...
May 28, 2012 |
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DNA evidence shows that marine reserves help to sustain fisheries
Researchers reporting online on May 24 in the Cell Press journal Current Biology present the first evidence that areas closed to all fishing are helping to sustain valuable Australian fisheries. The intern ...
May 24, 2012 |
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Japan enters commercial space race
Japan will put a commercial satellite into space on Friday, officials said, in its first foray into the European- and Russian-dominated world of contract launches.
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
May 16, 2012 |
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Elephant seal tracking reveals hidden lives of deep-diving animals
Researchers at the University of California, Santa Cruz, who pioneered the use of satellite tags to monitor the migrations of elephant seals have compiled one of the largest datasets available for any marine mammal species, ...
May 15, 2012 |
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Questions about incredible sea turtle migration answered
Immediately after emerging from their underground nests on the lush beaches of eastern Florida, loggerhead sea turtles scramble into the sea and embark alone on a migration that takes them around the entire ...
May 15, 2012 |
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Latest Southern Ocean research shows continuing deep ocean change
New research by teams of Australian and US scientists has found there has been a massive reduction in the amount of Antarctic Bottom Water found off the coast of Antarctica. Comparing detailed measurements taken during the ...
Space & Earth / Earth Sciences
May 21, 2012 |
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Research group suggests Madagascar's unique animals arrived on rafts
(PhysOrg.com) -- Ever since the island of Madagascar was first visited by people, some two thousand years ago, there has been speculation about the unique plants and animals that live on the world’s ...
Mar 20, 2012 |
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Japan in first commercial satellite launch
Japan joined the commercial space race Friday after its workhorse rocket put a paid-for South Korean satellite into orbit, pitting the country against Russia and Europe in the competition for customers.
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
May 17, 2012 |
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Missing sunspots: Solar mystery solved
The Sun has been in the news a lot lately because it's beginning to send out more flares and solar storms. Its recent turmoil is particularly newsworthy because the Sun was very quiet for an unusually long ...
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
Mar 02, 2011 |
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Ocean currents speed melting of Antarctic ice
Stronger ocean currents beneath West Antarctica's Pine Island Glacier Ice Shelf are eroding the ice from below, speeding the melting of the glacier as a whole, according to a new study in Nature Geoscience. A grow ...
Space & Earth / Earth Sciences
Jun 26, 2011 |
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Crocodiles ride ocean currents to travel the high seas
University of Queensland ecologists have unlocked the mystery of how salt-water crocodiles cross large stretches of the sea despite being poor swimmers - they like to surf.
Jun 04, 2010 |
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Pacific islands may become refuge for corals in a warming climate, study finds
Scientists have predicted that ocean temperatures will rise in the equatorial Pacific by the end of the century, wreaking havoc on coral reef ecosystems. But a new study shows that climate change could cause ocean currents ...
Apr 29, 2012 |
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New research points to the significant role of oceans in ancient global cooling (w/ video)
(PhysOrg.com) -- Thirty-eight million years ago, tropical jungles thrived in what are now the cornfields of the American Midwest and furry marsupials wandered temperate forests in what is now the frozen Antarctic. ...
Space & Earth / Earth Sciences
May 26, 2011 |
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Study finds warm ocean currents cause majority of ice loss from Antarctica
Reporting this week in the journal Nature, an international team of scientists led by British Antarctic Survey (BAS) has established that warm ocean currents are the dominant cause of recent ice loss from A ...
Space & Earth / Earth Sciences
Apr 25, 2012 |
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Ocean current
An ocean current is a continuous, directed movement of ocean water generated by the forces acting upon the water, such as the Earth's rotation, wind, temperature, salinity differences and tides caused by the gravitational pull of the Moon and the Sun. Depth contours, shoreline configurations and interaction with other currents influence a current's direction and strength.
Ocean currents can flow for thousands of kilometers, and together they create the great flow of the global conveyor belt which plays a dominant part in determining the climate of many of the Earth’s regions. Perhaps the most striking example is the Gulf Stream, which makes northwest Europe much more temperate than any other region at the same latitude. Another example is the Hawaiian Islands, where the climate is cooler (sub-tropical) than the tropical latitudes in which they are located, because of the effect of the California Current.
For more information about Ocean current, read the full article at
Wikipedia.
This text uses material from Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.
