The ocean conveyor belt, scientifically termed the global meridional overturning circulation (MOC), is a planetary-scale, density-driven circulation system that links surface and deep waters across all major ocean basins. It is governed primarily by thermohaline processes, whereby variations in temperature and salinity control seawater density, inducing deep-water formation in high-latitude regions (e.g., North Atlantic) and upwelling in lower latitudes and the Southern Ocean. This circulation redistributes heat, dissolved gases, nutrients, and biogeochemical tracers, exerting strong control on Earth’s climate system, carbon cycle, and deep-ocean ventilation on decadal to millennial timescales.
A patch of the Atlantic Ocean just south of Greenland is cooling while much of the world warms. The origin of this "cold blob" has been linked to weakening ocean currents that help regulate global climate—called the Atlantic ...
Earth Sciences
Jul 1, 2025
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At this year's Living Planet Symposium, attendees heard how ESA's Next Generation Gravity Mission could provide the first opportunity to directly track a vital ocean circulation system that warms our planet—but is now weakening, ...
Earth Sciences
Jun 26, 2025
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For more than a century, a patch of cold water south of Greenland has resisted the Atlantic Ocean's overall warming, fueling debate among scientists. A new study identifies the cause as the long-term weakening of a major ...
Earth Sciences
Jun 21, 2025
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Despite global reductions in mercury emissions, mercury concentrations in Arctic wildlife continue to rise. A study published in Nature Communications by researchers from Aarhus University and the University of Copenhagen ...
Environment
Jun 12, 2025
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In the southern flanks of the Indian Ocean and the central and eastern Pacific, just north of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, lie the Subantarctic Mode Waters. As part of the global ocean conveyor belt, these large masses ...
Earth Sciences
Jun 2, 2025
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The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) serves as the Atlantic Ocean's conveyor belt, transporting warm water north toward the Arctic Circle and returning cold, dense water back to the tropics. Nearshore areas ...
Earth Sciences
May 29, 2025
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A team of geophysicists and atmospheric scientists at Princeton's NOAA/Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory and the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science has found evidence that a warming planet over the ...
Beneath the surface of the Southern Ocean, vast volumes of cold, dense water plunge off the Antarctic continental shelf, cascading down underwater cliffs to the ocean floor thousands of meters below. These hidden waterfalls ...
Earth Sciences
Apr 22, 2025
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Northern Europe is relatively warm given its place on the globe. For example, although north of most major Canadian cities, London is warmer than all of them (even Vancouver in British Columbia). But this warmth could disappear ...
