Ocean Characteristics
What substance makes up most of the ocean's salt?
Sodium Chloride
What are narrow channels of rapidly flowing water back to the sea caused by large breakers?
Rip currents
What is a circular, coral reef island that grows around a seamount?
Atoll
What are the plastic tubes that are lowered to a certain depth and trap water, allowing scientist to take a sample of ocean water at particular depths?
Niskin bottles
What is the outer edge of a glacier that floats on the ocean's surface?
Ice shelf
What is the difference between the rest and trough of a wave?
Crest - highest point of the wave
Trough - depression in the water between crests
What are fertile areas that are caused by deep and cool waters moving towards the surface of the coast due to winds blowing away the surface waters?
Upwellings
When talking about the ocean floor, which area often has a ton of undersea life?
Continental shelf
What is a pool of shallow, salty water in the middle of an atoll?
Lagoon
What is the method that detects the reflections of sound waves off of the ocean surface?
Sonar
What are whitecaps?
foamy crests on the waves caused by strong winds
What are ocean swells?
Gentle, rolling waves that appear even during calm weather
What is the deepest point in the sea?
Challenger Deep
Define the difference between ROVs and UAVs.
Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROV) - a robot that is attached to a ship by cables
Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (UAV) - explore the ocean without any outside guidance or help
Which current is partly responsible for Great Britain's mild climate?
Gulf Stream
What two factors determine the density of seawater?
Temperature
Salinity
Daily Double!!!!
Define diurnal and semidiurnal tides.
Diurnal tides - one high tide and one low tide per day
Semidiurnal tides - two high tides and two low tides that both rise and fall at the same level
What is a rift?
a huge valley in the mountain range where the crust appears to be separating
What is the difference between gravity corers and piston corers?
Gravity corers - brings back narrow cores of sediment
Piston corers - bring huge cores up to the surface and are more accurate than gravity corers
Northern hemisphere - rotates clockwise
Southern hemisphere - rotates counterclockwise
Explain the differences in color in the shallow ocean versus deep ocean areas.
As the light passes through shallow water, it appears to be a brighter blue because there isn’t enough water to absorb that light.
Beneath the surface - colors are affected by the depth of the ocean
Why do icebergs float?
What do profiling floats do?
Chart ocean currents far beneath the surface
What did the HMS Challenger do? What sea feature did it discover?
mapped the sea bottom, found ocean creatures, and obtained samples of the ocean floor
Discovered the Mariana trench
What is the difference between neap and spring tides, including what causes them?
Spring tides - the sun and moon’s gravitational forces pull the tide that it higher than normal
Neap tides - weaker than normal tides caused by the moon and sun being perpendicular to each other