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University of Montana Grant Will Place Sensors Beneath Arctic Ice
University of Montana chemistry Professor Mike DeGrandpre and his partners have been awarded a $926,000 National Science Foundation grant, which will fund placement of carbon dioxide and pH sensors in the perennially ice-covered portion of the Arctic Ocean.
The sensors will be placed on ice-tethered profilers to be deployed by DeGrandpre collaborators John Toole and Rick Krishfield of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Ten CO2 and pH sensors in six locations will be placed just below the ice by drilling holes through the ice.
Data will be transmitted back to Woods Hole in Massachusetts via satellite, where it can be viewed as the sensors drift with the Arctic ice pack. More information on the ITP instruments is online at http://www.whoi.edu/itp.
The ITPs will be part of a larger Arctic Observing Network, in which sensors of all kinds are used to document changes in the Arctic.
"With global warming we are seeing less summer sea ice, and the sea surface is warming and freshening," DeGrandpre said. "This changing physical environment is altering the carbon cycle in the Arctic Ocean."
He said it’s unknown whether carbon sources and sinks will change and whether these changes will lead to increased CO2 accumulation in the atmosphere, causing further warming.
The sensors also will study the penetration of human-produced CO2 in the Arctic Ocean, which leads to acidification with potentially fatal consequences for many organisms. The sensors will document changes in the CO2 cycling and ocean acidification in the Arctic during the next three to four years.
The CO2 and pH sensors will be customized for deployment in the Arctic by Missoula’s Sunburst Sensors, a company co-owned by DeGrandpre and spawned by his UM research. The research project also will support development of an exhibit highlighting climate change effects on the oceans at spectrUM Discovery Area, an interactive science center for children in UM’s Skaggs Building.
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