Ocean Basics
About what percentage of Earth’s surface is covered by oceans?
What is 70%?
Ocean water is about 96.5% what?
What is water?
Name one major gas dissolved in ocean water.
What is oxygen / nitrogen / carbon dioxide?
What is the average salinity of ocean water (in parts per thousand)?
What is about 35‰?
What is the thermocline?
What is a layer where temperature drops rapidly with depth?
Oceans help regulate Earth’s temperature by storing and moving what?
What is heat (thermal energy)?
The remaining 3.5% of ocean water is mostly what?
What are dissolved salts (solids)?
Cold water can dissolve more or less gas than warm water?
What is more gas?
Salinity increases when water evaporates or when seawater what?
What is freezes?
Most marine life lives in the top how many meters of the ocean?
What is about 100 meters?
Oceans provide food, water, energy, and support for most of what on Earth?
What is life?
Besides salts, ocean water also contains gases and what else?
What are living organisms?
Warm ocean water causes dissolved gases to do what?
What is be released?
Rain and rivers cause salinity to do what?
What is decrease?
What type of organism drifts with ocean currents?
What is plankton?
Name one major way oceans are important to humans.
What is climate regulation / food source / water source / energy?
What term describes the dissolved substances in ocean water?
What is salinity?
Oceans absorb large amounts of carbon dioxide, acting as what?
What is a carbon sink?
Cold, salty water is more or less dense than warm, fresh water?
What is more dense?
Organisms that swim actively are called what?
What is nekton?
Plankton are important because they form the base of what?
What is the marine food web?
Ocean water is more dense than freshwater mainly because of what two factors?
What are salt and temperature?
The process of removing salt from seawater is called what?
What is desalination?
Differences in density help drive what major ocean process?
What are deep ocean currents?
Organisms that live on the ocean floor are called what?
What is benthos?