State of the Planet

News from the Columbia Climate School

R/V Marcus G. Langseth3

  • Why I Care About the Bottom of the Ocean

    Why I Care About the Bottom of the Ocean

    It is the middle of the night and I am wide awake thinking about the ocean, specifically the bottom of the ocean. Is it rocky? Jumbled? Smooth? Rocky is bad. Jumbled is bad. Smooth is good.

  • Holidays on the High Seas

    Holidays on the High Seas

    With round-the-clock shifts, there are precious opportunities for Santa to slip onto a research ship unseen. But slip in he did, leaving treats and gifts around the R.V. Langseth to brighten our day.

  • Retrieving Instruments from the Deep

    Retrieving Instruments from the Deep

    Over the first 22 days aboard the R/V Marcus G. Langseth, we’ve zigged and zagged our way over a 360×240 mile region of the Pacific plate, first dropping instruments to the seafloor, and then shooting airguns to them (see previous posts). The final step is to recover a subset of the instruments:  34 ocean-bottom seismometers…

  • The Art of Sound in the Ocean

    The Art of Sound in the Ocean

    The NoMelt experiment aims to image the structure of an oceanic plate, including its deepest reaches up to 70 km beneath the seafloor.  One of our primary means to do so is to create sound (acoustic) waves in the ocean from the ship, and record those waves at receivers on the seafloor, after they have…

  • Deploying Instruments on the Seafloor in the Deep Ocean

    Deploying Instruments on the Seafloor in the Deep Ocean

    Oceanic plates are born at mid-ocean ridges, where hot mantle rocks are brought very close to the surface, partially melt, and then cool and crystallize. The newly formed rocks move outwards from the mid-ocean ridge, making way for the next batch of hot rock rising from below. Inch by inch, over millions of years, oceanic…

  • Rolling into Open Water in the Central Pacific

    Rolling into Open Water in the Central Pacific

    We nicknamed our project NoMelt because we seek to characterize a mature, pristine oceanic plate far from its volcanic origin at a Mid-Ocean Ridge, and away from areas of pronounced volcanism and melting that subsequently alter the structure of the plate.  Our site in the central Pacific fits these scientific needs. However, one downside is…

  • Probing an Oceanic Plate

    Probing an Oceanic Plate

    Everything that we understand about the rhythms of the Earth’s surface – the slow growth of mountain chains, the creeping expansion of the ocean basins, the abrupt upheaval of a major earthquake, the explosive eruption of a volcano – is viewed through the context of plate tectonics.  This simple yet highly successful model for describing…

  • Why I Care About the Bottom of the Ocean

    Why I Care About the Bottom of the Ocean

    It is the middle of the night and I am wide awake thinking about the ocean, specifically the bottom of the ocean. Is it rocky? Jumbled? Smooth? Rocky is bad. Jumbled is bad. Smooth is good.

  • Holidays on the High Seas

    Holidays on the High Seas

    With round-the-clock shifts, there are precious opportunities for Santa to slip onto a research ship unseen. But slip in he did, leaving treats and gifts around the R.V. Langseth to brighten our day.

  • Retrieving Instruments from the Deep

    Retrieving Instruments from the Deep

    Over the first 22 days aboard the R/V Marcus G. Langseth, we’ve zigged and zagged our way over a 360×240 mile region of the Pacific plate, first dropping instruments to the seafloor, and then shooting airguns to them (see previous posts). The final step is to recover a subset of the instruments:  34 ocean-bottom seismometers…

  • The Art of Sound in the Ocean

    The Art of Sound in the Ocean

    The NoMelt experiment aims to image the structure of an oceanic plate, including its deepest reaches up to 70 km beneath the seafloor.  One of our primary means to do so is to create sound (acoustic) waves in the ocean from the ship, and record those waves at receivers on the seafloor, after they have…

  • Deploying Instruments on the Seafloor in the Deep Ocean

    Deploying Instruments on the Seafloor in the Deep Ocean

    Oceanic plates are born at mid-ocean ridges, where hot mantle rocks are brought very close to the surface, partially melt, and then cool and crystallize. The newly formed rocks move outwards from the mid-ocean ridge, making way for the next batch of hot rock rising from below. Inch by inch, over millions of years, oceanic…

  • Rolling into Open Water in the Central Pacific

    Rolling into Open Water in the Central Pacific

    We nicknamed our project NoMelt because we seek to characterize a mature, pristine oceanic plate far from its volcanic origin at a Mid-Ocean Ridge, and away from areas of pronounced volcanism and melting that subsequently alter the structure of the plate.  Our site in the central Pacific fits these scientific needs. However, one downside is…

  • Probing an Oceanic Plate

    Probing an Oceanic Plate

    Everything that we understand about the rhythms of the Earth’s surface – the slow growth of mountain chains, the creeping expansion of the ocean basins, the abrupt upheaval of a major earthquake, the explosive eruption of a volcano – is viewed through the context of plate tectonics.  This simple yet highly successful model for describing…