News

DFG Pri­or­ity Pro­gram “Trop­ical Cli­mate Vari­ab­il­ity & Coral Reefs” (SPP 2299) now on You­Tube

The DFG Pri­or­ity Pro­gram "Trop­ical Cli­mate Vari­ab­il­ity & Coral Reefs" (SPP 2299) is launch­ing its own You­Tube chan­nel with a video on the "Chal­lenges & Aims".

Full Steam Ahead for the Ocean Decade with an Expanded National Committee

New members and ambassadors for the German Committee for the UN Ocean Decade commence their work

Launch of the cit­izen sci­ence pro­ject “Into the Deep”

The "Into the Deep" pro­ject, fun­ded by the European Union as part of the Erasmus+ pro­gram, was presen­ted at MARUM. This is a cit­izen sci­ence pro­ject in which cit­izens help re­search­ers to ana­lyze im­age ma­ter­ial to an­swer sci­entific ques­tions. It is based on high-res­ol­u­tion im­ages from the deep sea taken dur­ing sci­entific ex­ped­i­tions. Re­search­ers of­ten lack the time to com­pre­hens­ively ana­lyze im­age ma­ter­ial. The ini­ti­at­ors of the pro­ject see this as an op­por­tun­ity to act­ively in­volve in­ter­ested "cit­izens" in the pro­cessing of sci­entific ques­tions. The cent­ral tool here is the web-based im­age ana­lysis tool BiiGLE-PARTY.

Nocturnal artificial light in the focus of global research

Completion of this year's GAME project at GEOMAR

New members of the DAM International Advisory Board

The DAM International Advisory Board is starting the new year with some old and some new faces.

Climate change and human impact: Looking into the future of the ocean

METEOR expedition M197 uses the eastern Mediterranean as a laboratory for the future

Strong saltwater inflow into the Baltic Sea detected

A large influx of saltwater into the south-western Baltic Sea is currently being detected. The autonomous measuring station operated by the IOW at the Darss Sill has been measuring a strong inflow of salty water throughout the water column since 20.12.2023, which is a comparatively rare occurrence. Over Christmas day, it will become clear whether the inflow is similar in scale to the major saltwater intrusion in 2014.

Millions of mysterious pits in the ocean decoded

Study led by Kiel University shows for the first time how vertebrates shape the North Sea seafloor

Hydrothermal Mercury – the natural story of a contaminant

Human influences are responsible for the majority of mercury pollution in the ocean

Key to predicting heat events in Central Europe

GEOMAR study on atmospheric patterns and sea surface temperatures

Giving the Arctic Back Its Ice

Even if the global community were to double down in its efforts to protect the climate, it would not be able to give the Arctic Ocean back its ice. But, in a symbolic act, Hamburg-based conceptual artist Swaantje Güntzel has done just that: on 18 November, at Båtsfjord in the far north of Norway, she produced ice cubes from meltwater taken from the North Pole and let them slip into the sea. This artistic intervention is part of Güntzel's year-long fellowship at the Research Institute for Sustainability - Helmholtz Centre Potsdam (RIFS).

Adapting to hypoxia: Zooplankton influence the efficiency of the biological carbon pump in the Humboldt Current off Peru

arine organisms play a crucial role in the global carbon cycle. Phytoplankton absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and sequester it in organic matter that sinks to the deep ocean where it can be stored for long periods of time. Until now, this process – the biological carbon pump – was thought to be particularly efficient in oxygen-poor areas. A new study by researchers at the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel suggests that the influence of certain zooplankton species on the biological carbon pump has been underestimated. The scientists have published their findings in the journal Communications Earth & Environment.

Climate change could trigger methane release from the deep ocean