final blog

Oceanography is the branch of science that deals with the physical and biological properties and phenomena of the sea. During this course we learned a numerous amount about the ocean and did a lot of labs.  The labs taught us about the tides, the temperatures, the salinity, the density, the minerals found on the ocean floor as well as washed up on the shoreline. There is so much living matter within the waters, and we hardly even know the half of it all.  We learned that most hurricanes happen in the Summer, take a couple hours to take form, and strike the east coast days later. The moon has effects upon the ocean, and the tides are often high or low depending on time of day and the position of the moon. And, lastly, there was the study of heat in water. There is no cold, only less warm. If the water has a lower temperature, it has higher density. Deeper down in the ocean it is more dense and cold than it is up at the surface. I learned a lot of new interesting things during this class and got to experiment with differnt substances as well.

moons and tides

The moon, in additional to being a beautiful addition to the night sky, is also responsible for the changing ocean tides that we experience daily here on Earth. Basically, the moon has gravitational power, just like Earth does, and the moon's gravitational force exerts a powerful pull on the oceans on both sides of our planet. This causes the oceans to bulge away from the Earth. The ocean facing the moon bulges toward the moon, while the ocean on the other side of the Earth bulges in the opposite direction -- this is caused by the Earth actually pulling away from the ocean and toward the moon. The rotation of the Earth, along with the moon's gravitational pull, causes ocean tides to change.

High tide occurs when a body of water is facing the moon and the moon is pulling the water toward it with its gravity. High tide also occurs when an ocean is facing directly away from the moon, or when the moon is pulling the mass of the Earth away from the water. When the moon is neither overhead nor on the opposite side of the Earth, a body of water settles back into low tide. This sequence of high tide and low tide generally happens twice a day everywhere on the planet, approximately every 12 hours and 25 minutes, as the Earth rotates and the moon orbits. Each tide lasts about six hours.

So why aren't there tides in smaller bodies of water, like ponds or small lakes? It's because the entire body of water is the same distance from the moon throughout, so all the water experiences an equal gravitational pull

Tears of an ocean

Water dissolves more substances than any other known natural solvent. This property has both advantages and disadvantages from a biological point of view. On the positive side, water dissolves and carries the majority of substances needed for life processes to occur. There are literally thousands of biological compounds needed for an organism to live, and most need to be in solution to react. Remove water and life as we know it ceases. You can see this in beef jerky. By dehydrating beef, the biological processes of decomposition cease. This preserves the beef, keeping it edible for extended periods.
On the negative side, water also dissolves compounds that are harmful to life. Most poisons and toxins are water-soluble. This is why you have to be very careful to avoid exposure to pesticides and other toxic compounds - they have the potential to be easily dissolved into the water in your body.

The ability of water to dissolve so many substances is due to water's dipolar nature. During this activity session, you will explore the unique chemistry of salt water, how it is measured, its consistency and its physical characteristics.

hydrometer

A hydrometer measures the specific gravity of fluids (such as seawater) compared to the density of pure water. In this activity, we constructed our own hydrometer and then used it to measure the densities of fresh and salt water samples.


Salinity is the saltiness or dissolved salt content (such as sodium chloride, magnesium and calcium sulfates, and bicarbonates) of a body of water or in soil. Salinity is an important factor in determining many aspects of the chemistry of natural waters and of biological processes within it, and is a thermodynamic state variable that, along with temperature and pressure, governs physical characteristics like the density and heat capacity of the water. If you add salt to the water solution the hydrometer will float high due to the salt in their.By adding salt to water it does two things. The freezing point of the water goes down and the boiling point of the water actually goes up. It is easier to float in the ocean then a pool because the salt makes it more denser. The degree of compactness in a substance. Temperatures causes differences in the salinity of water because it messes with density. 

which way the wind blows

The earth has uneven heating beacuse of the tilt of the axis and the rotation which is spins. If the sun is shining directly on the earth it is hotter than when the sun is angled on the earth. In class we had a globe and a flashlight to demonstrate this drill. We held the flashlight above the globe and saw the light is showed when it was directly on the earth and when it was angled on the earth. I learned that direct sunlgiht is hotter. The earths rotation effects the air and water masses by spreading it out. In class we had a circle piece of paper on a pencil. We had to spin it around the pencil while our partner drops water on it. After doing this the water whirled out toward the sides. This showed how the air and water masses act while the earth rotates. The Hadley cell, named after George Hadley, is a tropical atmospheric circulation that is defined by the average over longitude, which features rising motion near the equator, poleward flow 10–15 kilometers above the surface, descending motion in the subtropics, and equatorward flow near the surface. This circulation is intimately related to the trade winds, tropical rainbelts & hurricanes, subtropical deserts and the jet streams.Coriolis effect is a deflection of moving objects when they are viewed in a rotating reference frame. In a reference frame with clockwise rotation, the deflection is to the left of the motion of the object; in one with counter-clockwise rotation, the deflection is to the right. Although recognized previously by others, the mathematical expression for the Coriolis force appeared in an 1835 paper by French scientist Gaspard-Gustave Coriolis, in connection with the theory of water wheels. Early in the 20th century, the term Coriolis force began to be used in connection with meteorology. The last activity we had a map of the world and we had to draw all different kinds of winds. The trade winds (also called trades) are the prevailing pattern of easterly surface winds found in the tropics, within the lower portion of the Earth's atmosphere, in the lower section of the troposphere near the Earth's equator.[1] The trade winds blow predominantly from the northeast in the Northern Hemisphere and from the southeast in the Southern Hemisphere, strengthening during the winter and when the Arctic oscillation is in its warm phase.doldrums is a colloquial expression derived from historical maritime usage, in which it refers to those parts of the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean affected by the Intertropical Convergence Zone, a low-pressure area around the equator where the prevailing winds are calm. The low pressure is caused by the heat at the equator, which makes the air rise and travel north and south high in the atmosphere, until it subsides again in the horse latitudes. Some of that air returns to the doldrums through the trade winds. This process can lead to light or variable winds and more severe weather, in the form of squalls, thunderstorms and hurricanes.The Westerlies, anti-trades,[1] or Prevailing Westerlies, are prevailing winds in the middle latitudes between 30 and 60 degrees latitude, blowing from the high pressure area in the horse latitudes towards the poles. These prevailing winds blow from the west to the east[2] and steer extratropical cyclones in this general manner. Tropical cyclones which cross the subtropical ridge axis into the Westerlies recurve due to the increased westerly flow. The winds are predominantly from the southwest in the Northern Hemisphere and from the northwest in the Southern Hemisphere.

loggerhead island

We had to make sure that we didnt put loud busy streets or a lot of people by the sea turtle nesting. We didnt want to disturb them and we put the research center right next to them. We put the fishing pier by all the neighborhoods so it was easy access. We made our golf course eco-friendly and we didnt make it to big because we didnt want it to take over the whole island. We put a bridge connecting the golf course to the resort and restaurant so it was easy access. We dont have many cars, people usually ride bikes or walk. We dont have any factories to let off smoke into the air and pollute it. I would of put more individual docks for boats so it was spread out rather than one big one. I also would include stop signs as well not just street light. Maybe even some sidewalks to encourage the people to walk and ride their bikes more.

a beach by another name

After doing this lab we got familiar with coasts. Primary coasts are generally young and are shaped by terrestrial processes, including erosion, river/stream deposition, glaciers, volcanic, and tectonic movements. Secondary coasts are shaped mainly by marine erosion or deposition due to wave action, sediment transport by currents, or building activities of certain organisms, generally these coasts are older. Primary coasts can be formed by land erosion, land processes, deltas, volcanic coast, and fault coasts. Secondary coasts form sea cliffs, sea caves, sea arches, sea stacks, and wave-cut platform.Bar-built estuaries are formed when sandbars build up along the coastline. These sand bars partially cut off the waters behind them from the sea. Bar-built estuaries are usually shallow, with reduced tidal action. Wind is frequently the most important mixing tool for the fresh and salt water. This type of estuary is common along the Texas and Florida Gulf coasts (East Matagorda Bay), in The Netherlands, and in parts of North Carolina (Albemarle Sound and Pamlico Sound). tectonic estuary is when the rapid movement of the Earth’s crust causes a large piece of land to sink, or subside, producing a depression or basin. These drastic changes typically occur along fault lines during earthquakes. If the depression sinks below sea level, ocean water may rush in and fill it. The same geological forces that create these depressions often form a series of natural channels that drain fresh water from nearby rivers and streams into these newly formed basins. The mixture of seawater and fresh water creates a tectonic estuary. Estuaries formed in this manner are typically very deep and surrounded by mountainous areas. San Francisco Bay, on the West Coast of the United States, is an excellent example of a tectonic estuary.estuaries are dramatically influenced by tides. When the tide is out, many aquatic creatures retreat into protective postures. Clams can close their shells, worms stay underground, while other creatures sleep. The change in temperature, the exposure to air and the vulnerability of being active during daytime are all reasons why some creatures are only active at night. Of course, some animals, like birds, are active during the low tide daytime because the supply of food is easier to get to.At night when the tide returns the estuary comes alive. The returning sea water floods and submerges creeks, salt marshes, mud flats, mangroves, and estuaries. The water brings protection from predators. Many estuary creatures become active only at night.Two ecosystem services that estuaries provide are water filtration and habitat protection. Estuaries produce more food per acre than the most productive mid-western farmland.Dynamics of Coastal Systems is about the dynamic interaction between water motion and seabed topography, which affects the natural response of coastal systems to change in external conditions and to human interventions — from the scale of seabed ripples up to the scale of entire barrier and delta systems. The book highlights major concepts developed during the past 50 years for the description of current-topography, tide-topography and wave-topography interactions. It provides simple analytical tools and models for diagnosing and predicting coastal response to change, with references to a great variety of coastal systems around the world. These concepts and tools are crucial for sustainable management of beaches, deltas and coastal wetlands.