Recipient organisationUniversity of ExeterSource-published name: University of Exeter
Funding£2.5M
PeriodMar 2024 — Mar 2029
In plain English
AI plain-English summary
A 10-metre-wide ocean eddy can move heat and carbon through the deep sea as powerfully as a major current, yet scientists cannot see them. The Brazil-Malvinas Confluence, where Atlantic and Southern Ocean waters collide off South America, is a global hotspot for these submesoscale currents—but existing instruments miss them entirely. COSSMoSS will combine ship-deployed acoustic sensors with autonomous underwater vehicles to capture these elusive flows at scales from 10 metres to 100 kilometres, then use the data to validate high-resolution simulations. If successful, the project will reveal how the ocean interior actually stirs and mixes heat, carbon, and nutrients—processes that underpin climate models and fisheries forecasts. This is fundamental science: no immediate practical application, but understanding how energy and tracers move through the ocean is essential for predicting how the climate system will respond to warming. Past breakthroughs in ocean mixing, for instance, transformed our understanding of how the deep ocean absorbs atmospheric carbon.
View original technical description
Capturing Oceanic Submesoscales, Stirring, and Mixing with Sound and Simulations (COSSMoSS) will tackle one of the most pressing questions in oceanography: what processes drive energy transfer and property distributions within the interior ocean? The global oceans underpin our climate and biosphere by distributing and storing tracers such as heat, carbon and nutrients. Yet, little is known about the submesoscale currents (SMCs) that both stir and mix these fundamental properties, and bridge large scale flows with microscale dissipation. Characterised by spatial scales of 10 m to 100 km, and timescales of hours to weeks, SMCs are inherently difficult to observe and model. COSSMoSS presents a pioneering experiment that will capture these unresolved interior phenomena at a global hotspot of ocean-basin interchange: the Brazil-Malvinas Confluence (BMC). Here Atlantic and Southern Ocean waters collide and exchange heat, salt, oxygen, carbon and nutrients. Sharp lateral gradients, energetic flows, and sloping topography are highly conducive to SMC generation, stirring, and mixing. Active acoustics will be combined for the first time with autonomous and vessel-based instrumentation to sample the BMC at unprecedented resolutions that capture SMCs. In parallel, observations will validate and advance cutting-edge simulations, to quantify SMC initiation, ubiquity and interactions. By revealing interior ocean dynamics in unparalleled detail, COSSMoSS will shed light on the pathways of oceanic tracer and energy exchange, leading to an improved understanding of our future biosphere and climate. My unique combination of expertise in ocean acoustics, dynamics, and research at sea, make me the ideal leader for COSSMoSS. While driving forward a new international collaboration with project partner Prof. J. McWilliams (University of California Los Angeles), I will use my demonstrated research independence, global profile, and leadership skills to ensure its success.
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