Dr. Roberta Hamme gave us a great presentation of “Ocean Oxygen Cycling from Robotic and Shipboard Observations” last week, in which she introduced her current study on ocean oxygen cycling and the techniques involved: the more “classic” or “traditional” sample-transportation-lab analysis, and the more “fancy” or “the nova of the remote in-situ measurement” ARGO floats. The old fashioned laboratory analysis definitely does a good job speaking of the accuracy and result reliability, but the ARGO floats offered us great flexibility supporting constant measurement of various parameters with great spatial coverage plus the capability of sampling data remotely once they have been set. Currently, ARGO floats are able to collect measurements including dissolved oxygen content as well as nitrate and chlorophyll concentration and etc. But, due to limitation that argon concentration measurement is yet not offered by ARGO floats, researchers still need to do it the old way in case they want to determine dissolved oxygen content variability. Another issue related to ARGO floats could be its 4 year life span. 4 years seem to be a long time, but it’s definitely not long enough when comes to the study involves pattern changes on a global scale.

She also briefly introduced us about the current decreasing trend of dissolved oxygen content around the north pacific region that has the potential to become an issue later due to the significance of dissolved oxygen to oceanic ecology. However, the reason of this slowly shown deoxygenation in North Pacific Ocean is yet to be determined. She mentioned that it’s yet to be determined the nature of this phenomenon – whether it’s a result of natural result or rather caused by anthropogenic activities.

As for the presentation itself, Dr. Roberta Hamme was confident and enthusiastic about the topic and the content. With the help of lots of graphs, she managed to simplify these complicated terms and make it really easy to understand (for people with no background at all). I appreciate the moderate pace and her calm voice a lot. She managed to answer questions with great details and good examples while offering some of her own opinion and experience. The detailed explanation made it easier for not only who raised the question but also people like me who has no background to understand the answer. One answer I would ask if given the chance would be whether the abandoned ARGO units will do damage to the ocean environment or not, if so what could be the potential countermeasure.

Unfortunately, I could not find any particular matter or idea that could be applied to my research, though any topic related to ocean issues is always intriguing to be discussed.