Flying fish can make powerful, self-propelled leaps out of water into air, where their long, wing-like fins enable gliding flight for considerable distances.
It appears these Flying Fish are in a no win situation, picked off above the surface by Frigatebirds and devoured underwater by the Dorado.
An artist’s concept shows NASA’s CloudSat spacecraft in orbit above Earth. Launched in 2006, it provided the first global survey of cloud properties before being decommissioned in March 2024 at the end of its lifespan. NASA/JPL
Over the course of nearly two decades, its powerful radar provided never-before-seen details of clouds and helped advance global weather and climate predictions.
CloudSat, a NASA mission that peered into hurricanes, tallied global snowfall rates, and achieved other weather and climate firsts, has ended its operations. Originally proposed as a 22-month mission, the spacecraft was recently decommissioned after almost 18 years observing the vertical structure and ice/water content of clouds.
As planned, the spacecraft — having reached the end of its lifespan and no longer able to make regular observations — was lowered into an orbit last month that will result in its eventual disintegration in the atmosphere.
When launched in 2006, the mission’s Cloud Profiling Radar was the first-ever 94 GHz wavelength (W-band) radar to fly in space. A thousand times more sensitive than typical ground-based weather radars, it yielded a new vision of clouds — not as flat images on a screen but as 3D slices of atmosphere bristling with ice and rain.
For the first time, scientists could observe clouds and precipitation together, said Graeme Stephens, the mission’s principal investigator at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. “Without clouds, humans wouldn’t exist, because they provide the freshwater that life as we know it requires,” he said. “We sometimes refer to them as clever little devils because of their confounding properties. Clouds have been an enigma in terms of predicting climate change.”
NASA’s CloudSat passed over Hurricane Bill near the U.S. East Coast in August 2009, capturing data from the Category 4 storm’s eye. This pair of images shows a view from the agency’s Aqua satellite (top) along with the vertical structure of the clouds measured by CloudSat’s radar (bottom). Jesse Allen, NASA Earth Observatory
Clouds have long held many secrets. Before CloudSat, we didn’t know how often clouds produce rain and snow on a global basis. Since its launch, we’ve also come a long way in understanding how clouds are able to cool and heat the atmosphere and surface, as well as how they can cause aircraft icing.
CloudSat data has informed thousands of research publications and continues to help scientists make key discoveries, including how much ice and water clouds contain globally and how, by trapping heat in the atmosphere, clouds accelerate the melting of ice in Greenland and at the poles.
Weathering the Storm
Over the years, CloudSat flew over powerful storm systems with names like Maria, Harvey, and Sandy, peeking beneath their swirling canopies of cirrus clouds. Its Cloud Profiling Radar excelled at penetrating cloud layers to help scientists explore how and why tropical cyclones intensify.
In this animation, CloudSat’s radar slices into Hurricane Maria as it rapidly intensifies in the Atlantic Ocean in September 2017.
Areas of high reflectivity, shown in red and pink, extend above 9 miles (15 kilometers) in height, indicating large amounts of water being drawn upward high into the atmosphere.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/CIRA
Across the life of CloudSat, several potentially mission-ending issues occurred related to the spacecraft’s battery and to the reaction wheels used to control the satellite’s orientation. The CloudSat team developed unique solutions, including “hibernating” the spacecraft during nondaylight portions of each orbit to conserve power, and orienting it with fewer reaction wheels. Their solutions allowed operations to continue until the Cloud Profiling Radar was permanently turned off in December 2023.
“It’s part of who we are as a NASA family that we have dedicated and talented teams that can do things that have never before been done,” said Deborah Vane, CloudSat’s project manager at JPL. “We recovered from these anomalies with techniques that no one has ever used before.”
NASA's CloudSat Sees Tropical Storm Harvey in 3D in 2017
Sister Satellites
CloudSat was launched on April 28, 2006, in tandem with a lidar-carrying satellite called CALIPSO (short for the Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observation). The two spacecraft joined an international constellation of weather- and climate-tracking satellites in Earth orbit.
Radar and lidar are considered “active” sensors because they direct beams of energy at Earth — radio waves in the case of CloudSat and laser light in the case of CALIPSO — and measure how the beams reflect off the clouds and fine particles (aerosols) in the atmosphere. Other orbiting science instruments use “passive” sensors that measure reflected sunlight or radiation emitted from Earth or clouds.
Orbiting less than a minute apart, CloudSat and CALIPSO circled the globe in Sun-synchronous orbits from the North to the South Pole, crossing the equator in the early afternoon and after midnight every day. Their overlapping radar-lidar footprint cut through the vertical structure of the atmosphere to study thin and thick clouds, as well as the layers of airborne particles such as dust, sea salt, ash, and soot that can influence cloud formation.
The influence of aerosols on clouds remains a key question for global warming projections. To explore this and other questions, the recently launched PACE satellite and future missions in NASA’s Earth System Observatory will build upon CloudSat’s and CALIPSO’s legacies for a new generation.
“Earth in 2030 will be different than Earth in 2000,” Stephens said. “The world has changed, and the climate has changed. Continuing these measurements will give us new insights into changing weather patterns.”
More About the Missions
The CloudSat Project is managed for NASA by JPL. JPL developed the Cloud Profiling Radar instrument with important hardware contributions from the Canadian Space Agency.
Colorado State University provides science data processing and distribution. BAE Systems of Broomfield, Colorado, designed and built the spacecraft. The U.S. Space Force and U.S. Department of Energy contributed resources. U.S. and international universities and research centers support the mission science team. Caltech in Pasadena, California, manages JPL for NASA.
CALIPSO, which was a joint mission between NASA and the French space agency, CNES (Centre National d’Études Spatiales), ended its mission in August 2023.
China's surveillance vessels have mapped Taiwan's coast as Beijing has increased the use of research ships for war preparation, according to a new report.
"The Zhu Hai Yun, which bristles with advanced monitoring and surveillance equipment, charted a course that appears intended to challenge Taiwan and probe the environment around the island," the report by the Centre for International and Strategic Studies (CSIS) said on February 26.
Described as "drone carrier," the Zhu Hai Yun was built by China State Shipbuilding Corporation and owned by Southern Marine Science and Engineering Guangdong Laboratory (Zhuhai), also known as the "Southern Ocean Laboratory" of Sun Yat-sen University, according to a May 2022 report in Marine Executive, a specialist publication on maritime affairs.
The vessel, which can controlled remotely and navigate autonomously in open water, was commissioned into service on January 12, 2023, Chinese state media outlet Global Times reported.
Beijing has increased the use of research vessels for missions in the Indian Ocean, which China says are for research purposes alone. In October 2023, controversy erupted after the Chinese research vessel Shi Yan 6 docked at the port in Sri Lanka's Colombo, which was protested by India. Experts have argued that vessels like Shi Yan 6 have links to the People's Liberation Army, Newsweek has previously reported.
Chinese research ship Shi Yan 6 proceeds to deck at a port in Colombo on October 25, 2023. China is increasingly using research vessels with links to the People's Liberation Army for gathering insights into Taiwan's military, a new report by the Center for International and Strategic Studies says.
Ishara S. Kodikara/Afp via Getty
"China's scientific research activities in relevant waters are for peaceful purposes and aimed at contributing to humanity's scientific understanding of the ocean. The activities are in strict compliance with the terms of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea," Wang Wenbin, a spokesperson for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, said on February 6 during the regular press briefing.
The CSIS report, however, underscores the ship's activities as part of what experts describe as an "all-domain pressure campaign" by the People's Republic of China against Taiwan.
"This represents one more tool the People's Republic of China is using in what I call the all-domain pressure campaign against Taiwan," Christopher Sharman, director of the China Maritime Studies Institute at the US Naval War College, told the Financial Times.
The Zhu Hai Yun research vessel has links to the PLA, the CSIS report said.
"Records indicate that the Zhu Hai Yun was built by the 704th Research Institute, a subsidiary of the massive state-owned defense contractor China State Shipbuilding Corporation. In 2020, the U.S. Commerce Department placed the 704th Research Institute on its Entity List for illegally acquiring U.S.-origin equipment to support the PLA," it said.
The Zhu Hai Yun, equipped with advanced monitoring and surveillance equipment, undertook a path closely along Taiwan's coast, engaging in activities that suggest a deliberate attempt to challenge the island and probe its surrounding environment, the report said.
Notably, near Taiwan's northern coast, the vessel significantly reduced its speed, an action that CSIS interpreted as conducting a research operation. Furthermore, the ship's course took it into the contiguous zone of Taiwan, coming within 24 nautical miles of the shore, and at points appeared to cross into this sensitive area, the report added.
"Data accessed from the Windward intelligence platform reveals that, besides the Zhu Hai Yun, only two other Chinese research vessels since 2015 have operated along Taiwan's east coast in a manner that was not suggestive of either direct transit or surveying the seabed for deposits of natural resources. Just one of those vessels, operating in 2021, circled Taiwan in a route similar to the Zhu Hai Yun's but did not venture nearly as close to the island," it said.
"I can see the PRC using this to penetrate the contiguous zone with a drone swarm to test Taiwan's response and that would greatly increase the risk of an incident," Sharman told the Financial Times.
Despite Chinese sources claiming that the Zhu Hai Yun's purpose is solely for civilian research, evidence suggests a blurred line between the vessel and the People's Liberation Army (PLA).
"In Dalian, the ship docked at a pier operated by the Dalian Institute of Measurement and Control Technology. One of the institute's primary roles is studying ship vibration and acoustics for the Chinese navy," the CSIS report said.
Zhu Hai Yun – chinese-built drone mothership boasts autonomous sailing systems
The Zhu Hai Yun is not just a simple research vessel; it carries unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) and undersea gliders equipped with technology such as side-scan sonar, identified by Chinese naval researchers as beneficial for detecting undersea mines and submarines, the report said. Aerial drones aboard the ship further extend its surveillance capabilities.
Furthermore, the Zhu Hai Yun's primary operator, the Southern Marine Science and Engineering Guangdong Laboratory (Zhuhai), underscores the vessel's links to China's military apparatus, being owned by the Zhuhai municipal government and managed by Sun Yat-sen University (SYSU), an institution with established connections to the PLA, the report said.
A navigational chart from the late Edo Period (1603-1867)
shows the disputed Takeshima islets as Japanese territory.
(Provided by the Japan Institute of International Affairs)
The disputed Takeshima islets are seen sandwiched between Japan’s Oki island group and South Korea’s Ullung-do island on a navigational chart from the late Edo Period (1603-1867).
South Korea’s foreign ministry summoned a Japanese diplomat on Tuesday to protest a claim in Japan’s annual diplomatic policy Bluebook over a group of islands between the countries at the center of a longstanding territorial row, Yonhap news reported.
Seoul’s official stance remains that Dokdo, which Japan claims as the Takeshima islands, is the “inherent territory” of South Korea.
Photo: AP
Earlier, South Korea’s foreign ministry said it “strongly protests” the claim made in the Diplomatic Bluebook issued by Japan on Tuesday and said the islands were historically and geographically its sovereign territory.
Localization with the GeoGarage platform (NGA nautical raster chart)
Rochers Liancourt with Google Earth satellite imagery
Official ENC from KHOA KR67BD58 at scale 1:5,000
While ties between the two countries have improved recently, the neighbors are at odds over the sovereignty of the islands called Dokdo in South Korea and Takeshima in Japan that lie about halfway between them.
The crew of a Korea Coast Guard ship unfurls banners carrying the phrase "Let's Overcome the Coronavirus" near the country's easternmost Dokdo Islets, in this file photo taken Sept. 2, 2021, eight days ahead of the 68th anniversary of Korea Coast Guard Day.
Geosciences sector proving its value across more than just the oil and gas industry CGG geoscience expert identifies multiple uses for offshore seismic and surveying services
The offshore geosciences sector has been increasingly adapting to meet other seismic and surveying needs outside of the oil and gas industry, with services such as geological and geophysical (G&G) surveys for offshore wind, geothermal and other types of seafloor surveys.
For instance, Kredo Offshore commissioned Fugro in late 2023 to perform metocean and wind measurements offshore Yeonggwang County in South Korea. Initial investigations are taking place at the project site to determine the suitability for an offshore wind development, with four Seawatch Lidar buoys deployed to take readings from wind, waves, current and meteorological conditions. Data collection will take place over 12 months, with real-time data supplied to Kredo and its consultants ahead of final reporting.
The SEAWATCH® Wind Lidar Buoy represents the next generation of multi-purpose buoys tailored
for the renewable energy industry.
The buoy accurately measures the speed and direction of wind across the diameter of wind turbine rotors, whilst sensors record oceanographic parameters such as ocean waves and current profiles.
The SEAWATCH® Wind Lidar Buoy is a cost-efficient way to measure wind data at heights of conventional offshore wind turbines for wind resource assessments and engineering design criteria.
In February 2024, PGS secured an offshore wind site characterization contract from an unnamed company for a project in Europe. PGS will mobilize a vessel early in July for the two-month acquisition program, deploying an ultrahigh-resolution 3D streamer. The aim is to provide more detailed subsurface data for shallower targets compared to conventional 2D and geotechnical surveys.
FWI technology
For the offshore oil and gas sector, CGG is working on the continued development of full waveform inversion (FWI) technology. These include more complex wavefield modeling, such as offered by elastic FWI, to improve models and images in more complex subsurface geology; pushing FWI to higher frequencies to greater detail at the reservoir and also for near-surface hazards; using 4D FWI for time-lapse reservoir monitoring direct imaging with FWI as a replacement for migration algorithms. However, according to the company, FWI technology can be applied to multiple offshore sectors.
“Reimaging of legacy seismic data is commonplace in the oil and gas industry, particularly when significant new technologies such as FWI become available. This is equally applicable to the cost-conscious offshore renewables market, where high-resolution reimaging of seismic data can be an alternative to acquiring and processing new datasets,” Marianne Lefdal, vice president of Geoscience Global Excellence with CGG, told Offshore.
She continued, “For example, high-frequency FWI and FWI imaging are capable of providing shallow near-surface hazard delineation for wind farm site surveys. In the case of CCUS, high-end reimaging can be combined with rapid interpretation of horizons and faults using machine learning to support screening studies in mature basins. In both examples, the integration of new technology with geoscience expertise is key to successful application for these specific use cases.”
Offshore wind
Sercel, the sensing and monitoring division of CGG, provides earth science, data science, sensing and monitoring services.
“In terms of adapting geophysical surveys to support energy transition projects, Sercel has a range of equipment solutions, which are perfectly suited to the subsurface monitoring of geothermal, CCUS and energy storage projects where high-quality marine streamer, OBN and downhole data will be critical for 4D monitoring,” Lefdal said.
Sercel and Kappa Offshore Solutions released PIKSEL in 2021. This compact marine seismic technology acquires data for high-resolution 3D imaging of targeted offshore areas. Kappa noted that the system was designed to improve the efficiency of geohazard assessment surveys, while also providing G&G data integration, which is relevant for the offshore renewable energy sector.
“For offshore renewables, Sercel has a compact marine seismic solution (PIKSEL), which is specially designed for acquiring the best seismic data for high-resolution 3D surveying and geotechnical services for offshore wind,” she said.
Morphosense provides structural monitoring instrumentation and digital twin solutions for the renewables, nuclear and defense sectors.
In March 2023, Sercel acquired Morphosense, a company that provides structural health monitoring and structural integrity management. At the time, Sercel said this addition allows it to access new market opportunities for the renewables, nuclear and defense sectors.
“Another aspect of offshore wind is the need to maximize the lifespan of assets like wind turbines exposed to challenging environmental conditions,” Lefdal continued. “Sercel has a range of structural health monitoring solutions, which collect precise real-time measurements of movement and vibrations for analysis and modeling. For offshore wind, its s-morpho sensors, AI-powered analysis and digital twin modeling solution can be used to identify signs of fatigue and wear and optimize preventive maintenance programs.”
Carbon storage
Utilizing its subsurface imaging technology, CGG supplies subsurface insights for carbon storage sites, which includes the initial site screening studies, 3D site characterization as well as planning the monitoring programs for injection and closure.
“We continue to look at how current technology in the oil and gas space can be re-focused to be applied to carbon storage such as 3D seismic imaging and 4D seismic monitoring, but also to continuously investigate what solutions are needed for the future,” Lefdal said.. “This R&D is designed to bring to production next-generation technology solutions that can answer the requirements of carbon storage whether they be driven by geology, regulations, cost structure or new data acquisition methods.”
In February of this year, CGG released its “Southeast Asia Carbon Storage Study” for the CCUS market. The study ranks and prioritizes opportunities at large scale across 58 basins in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam, covering a total surface area of more than 6 million square kilometers, with the aim to provide guidance in identifying the best basins and plays for potential carbon storage.
“We are continuing to expand our portfolio of carbon storage studies, with the recent addition of a ‘Southeast Asia Carbon Storage Study’ to our existing North Sea and US Gulf of Mexico,” Lefdal continued. “These involve the integration of geophysical, geological and data science expertise to create data-rich studies that provide a clear and reliable assessment of storage potential based on a proprietary quantitative and qualitative criteria-based screening methodology.”
The map provides an overview of the basins covered by the "Southeast Asia Carbon Storage Study" and a snapshot of storage play segmentation.
Geothermal
CGG has also been invested in geothermal resources research. Earlier this year, the company released a white paper on the potential of offshore geothermal energy as a future global resource. This occurred after completing global geothermal resource and associated lithium brine screening projects over the last three years.
“This is an area where oil and gas geoscience, drilling and engineering expertise could be repurposed to tap vast geothermal resources along the magmatically active ocean floor spreading centers and adjacent flooded rift systems,” Lefdal said. “These offshore areas could be optimal locations to harvest geothermal resources for power in conjunction with the co-production of freshwater, green hydrogen, and ammonia, collectively creating an alternative set of rapidly scalable green energy solutions.”
She continued, “There are some clear needs for the efficient development of geothermal resources, which include delineating the geothermal ‘reservoir’ and identifying key features such as faults and fracture swarms which, depending on the geology, can either act as fluid conduits and provide permeability in igneous settings or can compartmentalize the reservoir in deep sedimentary basins.”
CGG has experience with more than 150 multiphysics projects for geothermal resource delineation. According to Lefdal, seismic imaging and attribute analysis will be needed to provide details on faults and fractures, using technologies like fault-constrained tomography and least-squares imaging.
The schematic highlights offshore geothermal resource exploration and development adjacent to sea floor spreading centers generating baseload power, fresh H2O, green H2 and NH3 with the potential for CO2 storage and controlled ocean fertilization.
Deep
sea anglerfish like Ceratias holboelli colonized the midnight zone and
became sexual parasites after a global warming event millions of years
ago.
Anglerfish first colonized the ocean's midnight zone 55 million years ago, during a period of extreme global warming, a new study finds. The bizarre fish adapted to thrive in the deep sea by becoming sexual parasites, the researchers said.
Anglerfish first colonized the ocean's midnight zone 55 million years ago, during a period of extreme global warming, a new study finds. The bizarre fish adapted to thrive in the deep sea by becoming sexual parasites, the researchers said.
These fish, in the order Lophiiformes, are among the most diverse vertebrate groups in the deep sea, having assumed a myriad of forms. Among their most recognizable features are their bioluminescent lures. The light from these dangling organs entices prey, drawing them within inches of a nightmarish array of needle-like teeth.
Angler fish and other monsters from the dark depths of the ocean attract unsuspecting fish with their weird and wonderful brightly lit lures.
Many anglerfish species patrol the benthic, or seafloor, zone, ranging from the near shore to depths of thousands of feet. They walk along the bottom using modified fins that resemble legs. But others live in deep open water of the bathypelagic, or midnight zone, 3,000 to 13,000 feet (900 to 4,000 meters) below the surface.
A new study, published Jan. 15 on the preprint server BioRxiv, suggests anglerfish of the group Ceratioidea colonized the midnight zone during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, which occurred 55 million years ago and lasted for around 200,000 years.
This period may have been initiated by volcanic events that released methaneinto the atmosphere. The temperatures were so extreme, polar seas reached temperatures of up to 73 degrees Fahrenheit (23 degrees Celsius), while tropical sea surface temperatures may have gotten as warm as 97 F (36 C).
The event wiped out numerous deep-sea organisms and likely opened up new ecological niches. And ceratioid anglerfish, it appears, were primed to take advantage of them thanks to a set of unique adaptations, the researchers revealed.
Most ceratioid anglerfish diverged from their more-coastal cousins 50 million to 30 million years ago, aligning with these climatic shifts.
A female anglerfish with male sexual parasites attached to her body.
(Image credit: Neil Bromhall/Shutterstock)
"What we found is that they went into the deep ocean, much like whales going back into the ocean from walking ancestors," lead author Chase Brownstein, a first year graduate student at Yale, told Live Science. "Anglerfish just did it in reverse. They were walking on the ocean floor and they went back up into the water column."
Living in the midnight zone means having no real home — there are no reefs, caves, seaweed or other substrate to grasp onto. This lifestyle is not conducive to finding a mate, but the researchers suggest anglerfish adopted new breeding strategies to thrive in this featureless landscape.
"The males have these giant nostrils. It's very sci-fi. We think they're picking up on pheromones," Brownstein said.
When an anglerfish does encounter a potential partner in the darkness, it doesn't want to let go. Sometimes, males temporarily attach to females, which are significantly larger. "The dimorphism is ridiculous," Brownstein said. "Males are 1/100 the size of females in some cases."
The anglerfish uses a shiny lure to bring prey within range of its sharp teeth.
But it also has a weirdly clingy side — after finding a female, the male black devil angler latches on and never lets go!
And sometimes the males fuse to their partners permanently — that is, the males are sexual parasites, merging with females' bodies. In some species, only one male fuses with the female. In others, multiple males may attach to the female.
This unique reproductive strategy is the result of immune system deficiencies. Typically, the adaptive immune system would recognize and destroy foreign cells. But the loss of these immune functions — the generation of certain antibodies for example —enables the female to accept the male as part of her own body, feeding him with her blood supply. He in turn serves as a permanent sperm bank.
The researchers believe that the degeneration of the immune system and its facilitation of sexual parasitism were advantageous during this period of radical ecosystem upheaval, allowing anglerfish to head off into the featureless depths and diversify into the array of Lovecraftian creatures that stalk the midnight zone today.
"I think this might be an example of what's called exaptation, which is the idea that traits that don't have a clear positive adaptive role are later expressed in a new context and do provide an adaptive role," Brownstein said.
Artist Matthew Attard turned to eye-tracking technology to generate a fresh take on images of ships carved by seafarers on chapels in Malta hundreds of years ago
At the 60th Venice Biennale, Maltese artist Matthew Attard addresses his country’s maritime heritage, along with notions of faith and progress, through the prism of AI-driven technology.
His work focuses on images of ships that were graffitied by seafarers on the stone facades of chapels in Malta between the 16th and 19th centuries, one of which is pictured below.
Ship graffito at Our Lady of the Visitation Chapel, Wied Qirda – Żebbuġ, Malta Elyse Tonna
Attard, pictured below, retraced the incised lines of the hulls, rigging and billowing sails using his gaze, in a process facilitated by an eye-tracking device and generative algorithms.
“This gaze was translated into data points by the technology, which were then further interpreted to generate lines or drawings,” he says.
A database of digital images generated from the data points captured the engravings from various perspectives, from which artworks such as 3D scans and video pieces were created.
Matthew Attard with an eye-tracking device. Elyse Tonna
The maritime graffiti resonates with cultures whose relationship with the sea has been – and still is – crucial, where the ship remains a metaphor for hope and survival.
Similarly, Maltese chapels have long been places of sanctuary.
Attard says he wanted to explore “parallels with our current ‘blind faith’ in digital technology”.
His reinterpretations of the etchings are ghostlike, skeletal impressions, as shown in the main image. “One could argue that even the most traditional mediums, such as a pencil or a piece of charcoal, can be considered a form of drawing technology,” he notes.
His show is at the Malta Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, Italy, commissioned by Arts Council Malta, until 24 November.
The recent opening of China’s Qinling base, its third permanent Antarctic station, has worried some Australian and American observers. Their concerns suggest it may be time for Australia to delineate China’s Antarctic ambitions more clearly and better organise its response.
Qinling station Image Credit : China News Service - CC BY 3.0
Qinling is China’s first base located adjacent to the Ross Sea, south of Australia and New Zealand and near the US McMurdo base. Its satellite monitoring facility has raised Western apprehensions. Qinling could become another node in China’s People’s Liberation Army-affiliated BeiDou navigation network and be used to monitor Australian and New Zealand communications. Antarctica’s sheer remoteness and extreme climate limit its potential for Chinese military activities, at least with existing technology.
Some of Beijing’s own statements have supported these concerns, with China’s National Defense University’s Science of Military Strategy (2020) stating that “the polar regions have become an important direction for our country’s interests to expand overseas and far frontiers, and it has also proposed new issues and tasks for the use of our country’s military power”. Elizabeth Buchanan notes that the Chinese government’s civil-military fusion law requires “all civilian research activities…to have military application or utility for China. This extends to China’s Antarctic footprint”.
Qinling is China’s newest station to begin operations in Antarctica. Concerns raised about China’s new research station in Antarctica :
Qinling research station in Antarctica could intercept signals from Australia
(ABC News: Erwin Renaldi)
While experts should be concerned, they might be worried for the wrong reasons. Claire Young has stressed that Antarctica’s sheer remoteness and extreme climate limit its potential for Chinese military activities, at least with existing technology. She argues that Qinling is simply too distant from Australia and New Zealand to effectively monitor their communications. China could more easily monitor from neighbouring states or its disputed South China Sea artificial islands.
A 2023 RAND study, while acknowledging the potential military risks posed by China’s Antarctic activities, added that Chinese officials have affirmed their respect for the 1959 Antarctic Treaty and subsequent protocols, collectively known as the Antarctic Treaty System. The Madrid Protocol, for instance, banned Antarctic mining. China is a signatory.
The Ross Sea Marine Protected Area includes a (1) General Protection Zone; (2) Special Research Zone; and (3) Krill Research Zone (Wikimedia Commons)
What, then, are China’s long-term ambitions? Buchanan has argued that, in the Antarctic semi-regulated global commons, “presence equals power”. RAND, through an examination of both English- and Chinese-language sources, concluded that Beijing seeks a “right to speak” in Antarctic regional affairs and that this could be part of China’s efforts to shift the balance of Antarctic influence in its favour ahead of any future Antarctic Territory renegotiation.
These efforts appear to be driven primarily by economics, especially in regard to krill fishing and mining, both of which fall under China’s vague goal of Antarctic “utilisation”. Along with Russia, China’s long-distance fishing fleet – the world’s largest – is rapidly expanding its krill industry, deploying super trawlers in the name of scientific research (in krill research zones) that will eventually collect more krill than is allowed under the Antarctic Territory System.
Both Russia and China have repeatedly rejected new marine protection areas and are likely to continue growing their lucrative fishing industries. China has so far resisted other signatories’ efforts to rein in its fishing ambitions. While other signatories are willing to abide by the limits imposed by the Antarctic Territory System, China and Russia appear to want to ignore them. Australia and its allies and partners should publicly “name-and-shame” China’s activities when and if they violate the Antarctic Territory System.
People attend the launch ceremony of China's first domestically built polar icebreaker, Xuelong 2, or Snow Dragon 2, at a shipyard in Shanghai, Sept. 10, 2018.
Similarly, China is eager to undertake onshore and offshore mineral extraction in Antarctica, despite being a signatory to the 1991 Madrid Protocol, which bans such activities. Some experts posit that in the future, China may be able to develop advanced mining technologies in anticipation of the Protocol’s potential 2048 renegotiation where it may seek to legalise some forms of mining. As the Antarctic Territory System currently has no enforcement mechanism, RAND added that Chinese Antarctic mining activities could consequently open “the floodgates for similar activities”.
Given that any signatory can call for the Antarctic Treaty’s renegotiation at any time – a privilege China has yet to invoke – it appears Beijing is biding its time while diversifying its Antarctic presence. Under this reasoning, China’s recent actions, including the opening of Qinling base, constitute long-term shaping activities to place itself in the strongest position possible ahead of any changes to the Treaty.
How should Australia and its allies and partners respond? Some observers have highlighted the Antarctic Territory System’s provision for unannounced inspections as key to mitigating Chinese ambitions. However, Russia has demonstrated that it can block inspections by making “station runways inaccessible” and switching off station radios “to block parties landing”.
Nengye Liu has suggested that Australia update its 2009 Australia–China Joint Statement to explicitly ensure the peaceful stability of bilateral Antarctic relations, given China’s significant Australian Antarctic Territory presence. Australia and its allies and partners should publicly “name-and-shame” China’s activities when and if they violate the Antarctic Territory System. Australia should consider sanctions against relevant Chinese individuals, state-owned enterprises, and the Polar Research Institute of China.
Given the uncertainties of Antarctica’s geopolitical future, as evidenced by growing concerns over China’s regional activities and ambitions, it may be time for the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade to establish its own Antarctic Affairs office. Such an office could be charged with establishing Australia’s future strategy and contingencies, working across government to implement its official position, and negotiating and building an international consensus with allies and partners.
NASA’s PACE satellite’s Ocean Color Instrument (OCI) detects light across a hyperspectral range, which gives scientists new information to differentiate communities of phytoplankton – a unique ability of NASA’s newest Earth-observing satellite. This first image released from OCI identifies two different communities of these microscopic marine organisms in the ocean off the coast of South Africa on Feb. 28, 2024. The central panel of this image shows Synechococcus in pink and picoeukaryotes in green. The left panel of this image shows a natural color view of the ocean, and the right panel displays the concentration of chlorophyll-a, a photosynthetic pigment used to identify the presence of phytoplankton. Credit: NASA
NASA is now publicly distributing science-quality data from its newest Earth-observing satellite, providing first-of-their-kind measurements of ocean health, air quality, and the effects of a changing climate.
The data from PACE (Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem) will help us better understand how the ocean and atmosphere exchange carbon dioxide. In addition, it will reveal how aerosols might fuel phytoplankton growth in the surface ocean. Novel uses of PACE data will benefit our economy and society. For example, it will help identify the extent and duration of harmful algal blooms. PACE will extend and expand NASA's long-term observations of our living planet. By doing so, it will take Earth's pulse in new ways for decades to come.
The Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem (PACE) satellite was launched on Feb. 8, and has been put through several weeks of in-orbit testing of the spacecraft and instruments to ensure proper functioning and data quality. The mission is gathering data that the public now can access at
PACE data will allow researchers to study microscopic life in the ocean and particles in the air, advancing the understanding of issues including fisheries health, harmful algal blooms, air pollution, and wildfire smoke. With PACE, scientists also can investigate how the ocean and atmosphere interact with each other and are affected by a changing climate.
“These stunning images are furthering NASA’s commitment to protect our home planet,” said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson. “PACE’s observations will give us a better understanding of how our oceans and waterways, and the tiny organisms that call them home, impact Earth. From coastal communities to fisheries, NASA is gathering critical climate data for all people.”
“First light from the PACE mission is a major milestone in our ongoing efforts to better understand our changing planet. Earth is a water planet, and yet we know more about the surface of the moon than we do our own oceans. PACE is one of several key missions – including SWOT and our upcoming NISAR mission – that are opening a new age of Earth science,” said Karen St. Germain, NASA Earth Science Division director.
PACE’s OCI instrument also collects data that can be used to study atmospheric conditions. The top three panels of this OCI image depicting dust from Northern Africa carried into the Mediterranean Sea, show data that scientists have been able to collect in the past using satellite instruments – true color images, aerosol optical depth, and the UV aerosol index. The bottom two images visualize novel pieces of data that will help scientists create more accurate climate models. Single-Scattering Albedo (SSA) tells the fraction of light scattered or absorbed, which will be used to improve climate models. Aerosol Layer Height tells how low to the ground or high in the atmosphere aerosols are, which aids in understanding air quality. Credit: NASA/UMBC
The satellite’s Ocean Color Instrument, which was built and managed by NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, observes the ocean, land, and atmosphere across a spectrum of ultraviolet, visible, and near infrared light. While previous ocean color satellites could only detect a handful of wavelengths, PACE is detecting more than 200 wavelengths. With this extensive spectral range, scientists can identify specific communities of phytoplankton. Different species play different roles in the ecosystem and carbon cycle — most are benign, but some are harmful to human health — so distinguishing phytoplankton communities is a key mission of the satellite.
PACE’s two multi-angle polarimeters, HARP2 and SPEXone, measure polarized light that has reflected off clouds and tiny particles in the atmosphere. These particles, known as aerosols, can range from dust to smoke to sea spray and more. The two polarimeters are complementary in their capabilities.
SPEXone, built at the Netherlands Institute for Space Research (SRON) and Airbus Netherlands B.V., will view Earth in hyperspectral resolution – detecting all the colors of the rainbow – at five different viewing angles. HARP2, built at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC), will observe four wavelengths of light, with 60 different viewing angles.
Early data from the SPEXone polarimeter instrument aboard PACE show aerosols in a diagonal swath over Japan on Mar. 16, 2024, and Ethiopia on Mar. 6, 2024. In the top two panels, lighter colors represent a higher fraction of polarized light.
In the bottom panels, SPEXone data has been used to differentiate between fine aerosols, like smoke, and coarse aerosols, like dust and sea spray. SPEXone data can also measure how much aerosols are absorbing light from the Sun. Above Ethiopia, the data show mostly fine particles absorbing sunlight, which is typical for smoke from biomass burning. In Japan, there are also fine aerosols, but without the same absorption. This indicates urban pollution from Tokyo, blown toward the ocean and mixed with sea salt. The SPEXone polarization observations are displayed on a background true color image from another of PACE’s instruments, OCI. Credit: SRON
With these data, scientists will be able to measure cloud properties — which are important for understanding climate — and monitor, analyze, and identify atmospheric aerosols to better inform the public about air quality. Scientists will also be able to learn how aerosols interact with clouds and influence cloud formation, which is essential to creating accurate climate models.
Early images from PACE’s HARP2 polarimeter captured data on clouds over the west coast of South America on Mar. 11, 2024. The polarimetry data can be used to determine information about the cloud droplets that make up the cloudbow – a rainbow produced by sunlight reflected by cloud droplets instead of rain droplets. Scientists can learn how the clouds respond to man-made pollution and other aerosols and can measure the size of the cloud droplets with this polarimetry data. Credit: UMBC
“We’ve been dreaming of PACE-like imagery for over two decades. It’s surreal to finally see the real thing,” said Jeremy Werdell, PACE project scientist at NASA Goddard. “The data from all three instruments are of such high quality that we can start distributing it publicly two months from launch, and I’m proud of our team for making that happen. These data will not only positively impact our everyday lives by informing on air quality and the health of aquatic ecosystems, but also change how we view our home planet over time.”
The PACE mission is managed by NASA Goddard, which also built and tested the spacecraft and the ocean color instrument. The Hyper-Angular Rainbow Polarimeter #2 (HARP2) was designed and built by the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and the Spectro-polarimeter for Planetary Exploration (SPEXone) was developed and built by a Dutch consortium led by Netherlands Institute for Space Research, Airbus Defence, and Space Netherlands.
Rivers can flush rainwater over hundreds of miles to the sea, changing the makeup of coastal waters in ways that scientists are still discovering.
In this satellite image from December 2023, a large, sediment-rich plume from the Mississippi River spreads down the Gulf Coast of Louisiana and Texas following winter rains. NASA/OB.DAAC
New findings have revealed a coastal realm highly sensitive to changes in runoff and rainfall on land.
After helping stoke record heat in 2023 and drenching major swaths of the United States this winter, the current El Niño is losing steam this spring.
Scientists have observed another way that the climate phenomenon can leave its mark on the planet: altering the chemistry of coastal waters.
A team at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California used satellite observations to track the dissolved salt content, or salinity, of the global ocean surface for a decade, from 2011 to 2022.
At the sea surface, salinity patterns can tell us a lot about how freshwater falls, flows, and evaporates between the land, ocean, and atmosphere – a process known as the water cycle.
The JPL team showed that year-to-year-variations in salinity near coastlines strongly correlate with El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO), the collective term for El Niño and its counterpart, La Niña.
El Niño, linked to warmer-than-average ocean temperatures in the equatorial Pacific, can lead to more rain and snowfall than normal in the southwestern U.S., as well as drought in Indonesia.
These patterns are somewhat reversed during La Niña.
During the exceptional El Niño event of 2015, for example, the scientists traced a particularly distinct global water cycle effect: Less precipitation over land led to a decrease in river discharge on average, which in turn led to notably higher salinity levels in areas as far as 125 miles (200 kilometers) from shore.
At other times, the opposite was found: Areas with higher-than-normal rainfall over land saw increased river discharge, reducing salinity near those coasts. “We’re able to show coastal salinity responding to ENSO on a global scale,” said lead author Severine Fournier, an ocean physicist at JPL.
The team found that salinity is at least 30 times more variable in these dynamic zones near coasts than in the open ocean.
The link between rain, rivers, and salt is especially pronounced at the mouths of large river systems such as the Mississippi and Amazon, where freshwater plumes can be mapped from space as they gush into the ocean.
Salt as Signal
With global warming, researchers have been observing changes in the water cycle, including increases in extreme precipitation events and runoff.
At the intersection of land and sea, coastal waters may be where the impacts are most detectable.
“Given the sensitivity to rainfall and runoff, coastal salinity could serve as a kind of bellwether, indicating other changes unfolding in the water cycle,” Fournier said.
She noted that some of the world’s coastal waters are not well studied, despite the fact that about 40% of the human population lives within about 60 miles (100 kilometers) of a coastline.
One reason is that river gauges and other on-sitemonitors can be costly to maintain and cannot provide coverage of the whole planet, especially in more remote regions.
That’s where satellite instruments come in. Launched in 2011, the Aquarius mission made some of the first space-based global observations of sea surface salinity using extremely sensitive radiometers to detect subtle changes in the ocean’s microwave radiation emissions.
Aquarius was a collaboration between NASA and Argentina’s space agency, CONAE (Comisión Nacional de Actividades Espaciales).
Today, two higher-resolution tools – the ESA (European Space Agency) Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) mission and NASA’s Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) mission – allow scientists to zoom to within 25 miles (40 kilometers) of coastlines.
Using data from all three missions, the researchers found that surface salinity in coastal waters reached a maximum global average (34.50 practical salinity units, or PSU) each March and fell to a minimum global average (34.34 PSU) around September.
(PSU is roughly equal to parts per thousand grams of water.) River discharge, especially from the Amazon, drives this timing.
In the open ocean, the cycle is different, with surface salinity reaching a global average minimum (34.95 PSU) from February to April and a global average maximum (34.97 PSU) from July to October. The open ocean does not show as much variability between seasons or years because it contains a significantly larger volume of water and is less sensitive to river discharge and ENSO.
Instead, changes are governed by planet-scale precipitation minus total global evaporation, plus other factors like large-scale ocean circulation.
We used three-dimensional imaging of ocean waves to capture freakish seas that produce a notorious phenomenon known as rogue waves. Our results are now published in Physical Review Letters*.
Rogue waves are giant colossi of the sea – twice as high as neighbouring waves – that appear seemingly out of nowhere. Stories of unimaginable mountains of water as tall as ten-storey buildings have populated maritime folklore and literature for centuries.
Recent technology has allowed scientists to spot rogue waves out at sea, making legend become reality. The first and most famous measurement was of the Draupner wave, a 25.6-metre monster recorded in the North Sea on January 1 1995.
Despite observations, we still don’t know how often rogue waves occur, or if we can predict them. A record of a rogue wave doesn’t include specific features that distinguish the sea around it, so we can’t make comparisons or predict the conditions needed.
Ocean surface during a storm somewhere in the Southern Ocean. Alessandro Toffoli
What creates rogue waves?
In the random environment of ocean waves, several mechanisms give rise to rogue ones. One primary source involves the overlap of multiple waves at the same location and time. This results in concentrated energy, leading to tall waves.
Under consistent ocean conditions, rogue waves generated this way may occur once every two days at a set location. But the ocean is dynamic, so conditions are rarely consistent for long – making it less likely for rogue waves to occur. The overlap of waves may be minimal or non-existent even during prolonged and intense storms.
Numerical and laboratory studies suggest strong winds also contribute to the development of rogue waves, because they push harder on some already tall wave forms. But wind has seldom been considered in rogue wave analysis.
Wind prompts ocean waves to grow progressively higher, longer and faster. During this stage, waves are “young” and hungry for wind input. When waves go faster than wind, they stop being accelerated by it and reach a “mature” stage of full development.
Through this process, the wind creates a chaotic situation where waves of different dimensions and directions coexist.
Our recent observations show that unique sea conditions with rogue waves can arise during the “young” stage – when waves are particularly responsive to the wind. This suggests wind parameters could be the missing link. However, there’s even more to consider.
Powerful waves amplify each other
Ocean waves are one of the most powerful natural forces on Earth and could become even more powerful in the future due to climate change. If the wave field possesses an extreme amount of energy – when waves are steep and most of them have a similar amplitude, length and direction – another mechanism can trigger the formation of rogue waves.
This mechanism involves an exchange of energy between waves that produces a “self-amplification”, where one wave grows disproportionately at the expense of its neighbours. Theoretically, studies show this could increase the likelihood of rogue waves ten-fold.
Recent experiments suggest wind can make extreme events like rogue waves more common. But this aspect has not been thoroughly explored.
The most extreme 'rogue wave' on record has just been confirmed in the North Pacific Ocean.
Picture: AP
What did we find in the Southern Ocean?
We used a new three-dimensional imaging method for scanning the ocean surface throughout the expedition. It mimics human vision: closely located sensors record sequences of simultaneous images. Computer algorithms then match pairs of them to reconstruct the three-dimensional depths – the wavy surface.
Example of the three-dimensional ocean surface reconstructed from synchronised images.
Hans Clarke
As our ship passed through several storms, the sensors captured data during various phases of wave growth – from the early stages of young waves fuelled by the wind, to mature waves that aren’t influenced by it.
Our results show young waves display signs of self-amplification and an increased likelihood of rogue waves. We recorded waves twice as high as their neighbours once every six hours.
This mirrors what lab models have reported: sea conditions theoretically more prone to self-amplification would produce more rogue waves.
In contrast, mature seas don’t show an increased probability of rogue waves. We detected none under those conditions.
Our findings challenge previous thinking: that self-amplification doesn’t change the likelihood of rogue waves in the ocean. We have also shown that when developing tools for predicting rogue waves, we need to take wind into thorough consideration. After all, it’s a natural feature of the open sea.
Chinese research ship Shi Yan 6 proceeds to deck at a port in Colombo on October 25, 2023.
A navigational chart from the late Edo Period (1603-1867)
PIKSEL is Sercel's high-resolution 3D marine seismic technology.
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Example of the three-dimensional ocean surface reconstructed from synchronised images.
