1 Building an Ocean Profile-Plankton Database: Progress Since the "International Workshop on Oceanographic Biological and Chemical Data Management" Ocean Biodiversity Informatics: International Conference on Marine Biodiversity Data Management Hamburg, Germany: 30 November 2004 Sydney Levitus, Bob Gelfeld World Data Center for Oceanography- Silver Spring

2 REASONS FOR BUILDING GLOBAL, HISTORICAL IN SITU OCEANOGRAPHIC DATA BASES a)The international scientific community advises national and international bodies on such issues as climate change (i.e. IPCC), biodiversity,... Historical data are required to support such studies. The international scientific community must have access to the most complete oceanographic data bases possible. These data bases must be accessible in electronic form and available internationally without restriction. b) Ocean measurement programs are expensive. Scientists planning such programs should have access to all available data in order to make the most efficient use of scarce scientific resources such as ships. c)Pollutants flow across boundaries. The international community should have access to all historical data for pollution transport studies. This is particularly important for studies of the coastal environment. Natural variability versus anthropogenically induced changes. d) To develop and improve long-range weather forecasts. Statistical forecasting and hind casting studies require historical ocean data.

3 The Global Oceanographic Data Archaeology and Rescue (GODAR) Project Established in 1993 by the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission. "Data Archaeology": the process of seeking out, restoring, evaluating, correcting, and interpreting historical data sets; "Data Rescue": the effort to save data at risk of being lost to the science community by digitizing manuscript data and copying data on older, failing electronic media, and then archiving these data into an internationally available electronic database.

4 GODAR Results Data added to NODC/WDC archives since 1994: 3.0 million temperature profiles 140,000 Chlorophyll profiles 142,200 plankton taxa Six Regional Workshops ( ) International Review Conference (July 10-13, 1999) Silver Spring, MD - hosted 75 representatives from 25 countries Recognized success of GODAR Project and established World Ocean Database Encouraged expansion into rescue of sea level and other datasets

5 What are the problems associated with building World Ocean Database? acquisition and preparation of data, metadata, documentation. missing or incorrect documentation (metadata) labor intensive received multiple times from different groups “near” duplicates”

6 World Ocean Database 2001 Global, comprehensive, integrated, scientifically quality-controlled with all data in one well- documented format. Available on-line: ( and via CD-ROM. Why is WOD01 characterized as a “heterogeneous” database? Data from 55,897 cruises; Data from 3057 ships and other platforms; Data from 489 institutes; Data from 112 countries.

7 NODC/WDC/OCL staff supporting WOD01 development John Antonov Bob Gelfeld Olga Baranova Daphne Johnson Tim Boyer Ricardo Locarnini Margarita Conkright Todd O’Brien Carla Forgy Igor Smolyar Hernan Garcia Cathy Stephens World-wide support from many scientists, institutes, and countries.

8 World Ocean Database 2001(WOD01) PROBE (Instrument Type)WOD98ADDEDTOTAL Bottle (OSD)1,373,440746,6022,121,042 Mechanical Bathythermograph (MBT)2,077,200299,0062,376,206 Expendable Bathythermograph (XBT)1,537,203206,3891,743,592 High Resolution Conductivity/Temperature/Depth (HCTD) 189,555122,789312,344 Profiling Float (e.g., PALACE, SOLO, APEX)022,637 Moored Buoy (e.g. TAO, PIRATA, TRITON)114,634182,762297,936 Drifting Buoy050,549 Towed Conductivity/Temperature/Depth (UOR)037,65137,631 Autonomous Pinniped Bathythermograph (APBT) 075,665 Total Casts/Profiles 5,292,032 1,773,3837,037,062 Total Surface-Only Observations 159,794 1,650,8521,810,646

9 Contributors to WOD01 Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission’s (IOC): Global Oceanographic Data Archaeology and Rescue project (GODAR), World Ocean Database (WOD) project, Global Temperature-Salinity Profile Project (GTSPP), World Ocean Circulation Experiment (WOCE), Joint Global Ocean Flux Studies (JGOFS), Ocean Margin Experiment (OMEX), Intergovernmental Program on Climate Change (IPCC), World Climate Research program’s CLIVAR program (WCRP).

10 Utility of NODC/WDC profile-plankton data as indicated by citations in the scientific literature* *Based on a search of the ISI Scientific Citation Index as of March 2004

11 WOD01 on-line (Web accessible)

12 The World Ocean Database retrieval system (WODselect) allows the user to select criteria and search for data in the World Ocean Database 2001 (WOD01). The stations matching the user's search criteria are then extracted and made available (via FTP) in WOD01 native data format. USER SEARCH CRITERIA: Geographic Area, Observation Dates, Instrument Type (e.g., OSD, CTD, XBT), Parameters, Deepest Measurement, Country, Ship/Platform, Project, Institute, Data exclusion using OCL quality control flags url:

13

14 OSD cast data acquired through the GODAR Project for compared to NODC archive holdings as of 1991

15 Building Ocean Profile-Plankton Databases for Climate System Research

16 Historical and modern chlorophyll data recovered as part of the GODAR and WOD projects 128,601 chlorophyll profiles, surface-only observations

17 WOD01 Plankton tows

18 International Ocean Atlas Series, Volume 2

19 International Ocean Atlas Series Partnership with the Zoological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg. Important for ecosystem response to climate change, ecosystem modeling. International Ocean Atlas and Information Series, Volume 6 Zooplankton of the Arctic Seas 2002

20 International Ocean Atlas and Information Series “36 year Time Series ( ) of Zooplankton, Temperature, and Salinity in the White Sea” Supports: 1)Ecosystem Response to Climate Change… 2) Understanding Climate Variability… 3) International Polar Year

21 Time series of ocean heat content (10 22 J)

22 Earths Heat Balance (10 22 J),

23 Linear trend of yearly ( ) ocean heat content (10 18 J) m

24 Atlantic- Linear trend ( ) of basin zonally-averaged salinity ( year -1 )

25 Atlantic- % variance accounted for by the linear trend ( ) of basin zonally averaged salinity

26 SEAWIFS versus CZCS summer chlorophyll estimate Figure 2. Summer (Jul-Sep) blended chlorophyll (mg m-3) distributions for the SeaWiFS era ( ), the CZCS era (1979-mid-1986), and their difference. (Gregg and Conkright, 2002, GRL)

27 SEAWIFS versus CZCS annual primary production estimate Figure 3. Annual primary production (Pg C y -1 ). (Gregg et al., 2003, GRL)

28 NODC’s Vision - We acquire and preserve the nation’s oceanographic data…with quality, consistency, and continuity; in a timely and easily accessible way; for the public interest, policy development, economic good of the nation, and the progress of science. We interpret the present in the context of the past for the prediction of the future. National Oceanographic Data Center NODC’s Vision - We acquire and preserve the nation’s oceanographic data…with quality, consistency, and continuity; in a timely and easily accessible way; for the public interest, policy development, economic good of the nation, and the progress of science. We interpret the present in the context of the past for the prediction of the future.