The Hawaii Ocean Time-series (HOT) program is a long-term

oceanographic Oceanography (), also known as oceanology, sea science, ocean science, and marine science, is the scientific study of the ocean, including its physics, chemistry, biology, and geology. It is an Earth science, which covers a wide range of top ...

study based at the

University of Hawaii at Manoa A university () is an institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly means "community of teachers and scholars". Univ ...

. In 2015, the

American Society for Microbiology The American Society for Microbiology (ASM), originally the Society of American Bacteriologists, is a professional organization for scientists who study viruses, bacteria, fungi, algae, and protozoa as well as other aspects of microbiology. It wa ...

designated the HOT Program's field site Station ALOHA (A Long-Term Oligotrophic Habitat Assessment; ()) a "Milestone in

Microbiology Microbiology () is the branches of science, scientific study of microorganisms, those being of unicellular organism, unicellular (single-celled), multicellular organism, multicellular (consisting of complex cells), or non-cellular life, acellula ...

", for playing "a key role in defining the discipline of microbial oceanography and educating the public about the vital role of marine microbes in global ecosystems." Scientists working on the Hawaii Ocean Time-series (HOT) program have been making repeated observations of the

hydrography Hydrography is the branch of applied sciences which deals with the measurement and description of the physical features of oceans, seas, coastal areas, lakes and rivers, as well as with the prediction of their change over time, for the primary ...

chemistry Chemistry is the scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a physical science within the natural sciences that studies the chemical elements that make up matter and chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules a ...

and

biology Biology is the scientific study of life and living organisms. It is a broad natural science that encompasses a wide range of fields and unifying principles that explain the structure, function, growth, History of life, origin, evolution, and ...

of the

water column The (oceanic) water column is a concept used in oceanography to describe the physical (temperature, salinity, light penetration) and chemical ( pH, dissolved oxygen, nutrient salts) characteristics of seawater at different depths for a defined ...

at a station north of Oahu, Hawaii since October 1988. The objective of this research is to provide a comprehensive description of the ocean at a site representative of the

North Pacific Subtropical Gyre The North Pacific Gyre (NPG) or North Pacific Subtropical Gyre (NPSG), located in the northern Pacific Ocean, is one of the five major oceanic gyres. This gyre covers most of the northern Pacific Ocean. It is the largest ecosystem on Earth, loca ...

. Cruises are made approximately once per month to the deep-water Station ALOHA located 100 km north of Oahu, Hawaii. Measurements of the thermohaline structure,

chemistry,

currents Currents, Current or The Current may refer to: Science and technology * Current (fluid), the flow of a liquid or a gas ** Air current, a flow of air ** Ocean current, a current in the ocean *** Rip current, a kind of water current ** Current (hy ...

, optical properties,

primary production In ecology, primary production is the synthesis of organic compounds from atmospheric or aqueous carbon dioxide. It principally occurs through the process of photosynthesis, which uses light as its source of energy, but it also occurs through ...

plankton Plankton are the diverse collection of organisms that drift in Hydrosphere, water (or atmosphere, air) but are unable to actively propel themselves against ocean current, currents (or wind). The individual organisms constituting plankton are ca ...

community structure, and rates of particle export are made on each cruise. The HOT program also uses

autonomous underwater vehicle An autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) is a robot that travels underwater without requiring continuous input from an operator. AUVs constitute part of a larger group of undersea systems known as unmanned underwater vehicles, a classification tha ...

s, including floats and gliders, to collect data at Station ALOHA between cruises.

Overview

HOT was founded to understand the processes controlling the fluxes of

carbon Carbon () is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol C and atomic number 6. It is nonmetallic and tetravalence, tetravalent—meaning that its atoms are able to form up to four covalent bonds due to its valence shell exhibiting 4 ...

and associated bioelements in the ocean and to document changes in the physical structure of the water column. To achieve this, the HOT program has several specific goals: :1. Quantify temporal (seasonal to decadal) changes in reservoirs and fluxes of carbon and associated bioelements (nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus, and silicon). :2. Identify processes controlling air-sea carbon exchange, rates of carbon transformation through the planktonic food web, and fluxes of carbon into the ocean. :3. Form a multi-decadal baseline based on the gathered data that will allow researchers to decipher natural and anthropogenic influences on the NPSG ecosystem. :4. Provide scientific and logistical support to other scientific programs that benefit from the research and services performed by the HOT program. This includes projects implementing, testing, and validating new methodologies, models, and transformative ocean sampling technologies.Project: Hawaii Ocean Time-series (HOT): Sustaining ocean ecosystem and climate observations in the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre

''BCO-DMO'', November, 2012 The

dissolved inorganic carbon Dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) is the sum of the aqueous species of inorganic carbon in a solution. Carbon compounds can be distinguished as either organic or inorganic, and as dissolved or particulate, depending on their composition. Organic c ...

data set that has been accumulated over the course of the HOT program shows the increase of

carbon dioxide Carbon dioxide is a chemical compound with the chemical formula . It is made up of molecules that each have one carbon atom covalent bond, covalently double bonded to two oxygen atoms. It is found in a gas state at room temperature and at norma ...

in the surface waters of the Pacific and subsequent acidification of the ocean. The data collected by these cruises are available online. The 200th cruise of the HOT program was in 2008. HOT recently celebrated its 25th year in operation, with the 250th research cruise occurring in March 2013.

Station ALOHA

Station ALOHA is a deep water (~4,800 m) location approximately 100 km north of the Hawaiian Island of Oahu. Thus, the region is far enough from land to be free of coastal ocean dynamics and terrestrial inputs, but close enough to a major port (Honolulu) to make relatively short duration (less than five days) near-monthly cruises logistically and financially feasible. Sampling at this site occurs within a 10 km radius around the center of the station. Each HOT cruise begins with a stop at a coastal station south of the island of Oahu, approximately 10 km off Kahe Point (21° 20.6'N, 158° 16.4'W) in 1500 m of water. Station Kahe (termed Station 1) is used to test equipment and train new personnel before departing for Station ALOHA. Since August 2004, Station ALOHA has also been home to a surface mooring outfitted for meteorological and upper ocean measurements; this mooring, named WHOTS (also termed Station 50), is a collaborative project between

Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI, acronym pronounced ) is a private, nonprofit research and higher education facility dedicated to the study of marine science and engineering. Established in 1930 in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, it i ...

and HOT. WHOTS provides long-term, high-quality air-sea fluxes as a coordinated part of HOT, contributing to the program’s goals of observing heat, fresh water and chemical fluxes. In 2011, the ALOHA Cabled Observatory (ACO) became operational. This instrumented fiber optic

cabled observatory A cabled observatory is a seabed oceanographic research platform connected to land by cables that provide power and communication. Observatories are outfitted with a multitude of scientific instruments that can collect many kinds of data from the ...

provides power and communications to the seabed (4728 m). The ACO is currently configured with an array of

thermistors A thermistor is a semiconductor type of resistor in which the resistance is strongly dependent on temperature. The word ''thermistor'' is a portmanteau of ''thermal'' and ''resistor''. The varying resistance with temperature allows these devices ...

, current meters, conductivity sensors, two

hydrophones A hydrophone () is a microphone designed for underwater use, for recording or listening to underwater sound. Most hydrophones contains a piezoelectric transducer that generates an electric potential when subjected to a pressure change, such as a ...

, and a

video camera A video camera is an optical instrument that captures videos, as opposed to a movie camera, which records images on film. Video cameras were initially developed for the television industry but have since become widely used for a variety of other ...

Field sampling strategy

A core suite of environmental variables was selected at the start of the program that is expected to display detectable change on time scales of several days to one decade. Since 1988, the interdisciplinary station work has included physical, chemical, biological and sedimentological observations and rate measurements. The initial phase of the HOT program (October 1988 – February 1991) was entirely supported by research vessels, with the exception of the availability of existing satellite and ocean buoy sea surface data. In February 1991, an array of inverted echosounders (IES) was deployed around Station ALOHA and in June 1992, a sequencing

sediment trap Sediment traps are instruments used in oceanography and limnology to measure the quantity of sinking particulate Organic material, organic (and inorganic) material in aquatic ecosystem, aquatic systems, usually oceans, Lake, lakes, or Reservoir, ...

mooring was deployed a few km north of it. In 1993, the IES network was replaced with two strategically positioned instruments: one at Station ALOHA and the other at the coastal station Kaena. A physical-biogeochemical mooring (known as HALE-ALOHA) was deployed from January 1997 to June 2000 for high frequency atmospheric and oceanic observations. HOT relies on the

University-National Oceanographic Laboratory System The University-National Oceanographic Laboratory System (UNOLS) is a group of academic institutions and National Laboratories organized in the United States to coordinate research vessel use for federally funded ocean research. Authority The UNOLS ...

research vessel A research vessel (RV or R/V) is a ship or boat designed, modified, or equipped to carry out research at sea. Research vessels carry out a number of roles. Some of these roles can be combined into a single vessel but others require a dedicated ...

Kilo Moana operated by the University of Hawaii for most of the near-monthly sampling expeditions. When at Station ALOHA, a variety of sampling strategies is used to capture the range of physical and biogeochemical dynamics natural to the NPSG ecosystem. These strategies include high resolution conductivity-temperature-depth ( CTD) profiles, biogeochemical analyses of discrete water samples, ''in situ'' vertically profiling bio-optical instrumentation, free-drifting arrays for determinations of

and particle fluxes, deep ocean sediment traps, and oblique

plankton net A plankton net is equipment used for collecting Sampling method, samples of plankton in standing bodies of water. It consists of a towing line and bridles, nylon mesh net, and a cod end. Plankton nets are considered one of the oldest, simplest a ...

tows. The suite of core measurements conducted by HOT has remained largely unchanged over the program’s lifetime. On each HOT cruise, samples are collected from the surface ocean to near the sea bed (~4,800 m), with the most intensive sampling occurring in the upper 1,000 m. HOT utilizes a “burst” vertical profiling strategy where physical and biogeochemical properties are measured at 3 hour intervals over a 36-hour period, covering 3

semi-diurnal A diurnal cycle (or diel cycle) is any pattern that recurs every 24 hours as a result of one full rotation of the planet Earth around its axis. Earth's rotation causes surface temperature fluctuations throughout the day and night, as well as we ...

tidal cycles and 1 inertial period (~31 hours). This approach captures variability in ocean dynamics due to

internal tides Internal tides are generated as the surface tides move stratified water up and down sloping topography, which produces a wave in the ocean interior. So internal tides are internal waves at a tidal frequency. The other major source of internal wa ...

around Station ALOHA. It is designed to assess variability on time scales of a few hours to a few years. High frequency variability (less than 6 hours) and variability on time scales of between 3–60 days are not adequately sampled at the present time.

Scientific findings

The 25 year record of ocean carbon measurements at Station ALOHA document that the partial pressure of (''p'') in the

mixed layer The oceanic or limnological mixed layer is a layer in which active turbulence has homogenized some range of depths. The surface mixed layer is a layer where this turbulence is generated by winds, surface heat fluxes, or processes such as evaporat ...

is increasing at a rate slightly greater than the trend observed in the atmosphere. This has been accompanied by progressive decreases in seawater pH. Although the effect of anthropogenic is evidenced by long-term decreases in seawater pH throughout the upper 600 m, the rate of acidification at Station ALOHA varies with depth. For example, in the upper mesopelagic waters (~160–310 m) pH is decreasing at nearly twice the rate observed in the surface waters. Such depth-dependent differences in acidification are due to a combination of regional differences in time-varying climate signatures, mixing, and changes in biological activity.

References

External links