College of Alameda

GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

CHAPTER/LECTURE 5

The Ocean Environment

The goals and objectives of this chapter/lecture are to:
 Determine the role and significance of the ocean environment on Earth.
 Develop an understanding of the characteristics of the ocean.
 Understand the limitations of oceanic exploration and current research.

Introduction

Now that we’ve taken a look at some of our freshwater environment, let’s examine our
largest source of water on Earth – the ocean environment. As mentioned in the previous
chapter/lecture, the ocean contains about 97 percent of all the water on Earth. In addition
to making up the vast majority of water stores, the ocean also holds the majority of the
planet’s moisture, terrestrial energy, and heat from the Sun. As we learned back in
Chapter/Lecture 3: Weather Processes and Phenomena, this energy is transferred between
the equator and the two poles through large surface wind currents and deep ocean
currents driven by differences in ocean temperature and density. The ocean also provides
the moisture and energy for storm systems and ultimately global climates.

The ocean is considered the largest source of oxygen on Earth due to the abundance of
oceanic plankton that thrive in sea water. These organisms absorb carbon dioxide and
produce oxygen through photosynthesis. Phytoplankton, microscopic plants, and animals in
the ocean provide the foundation of the global food web of species (more on food webs
when we discuss Biogeography in chapter/lecture 6). Additionally, the ocean is one of the
largest storages of carbon dioxide on Earth. The Earth’s ocean is so vital for life that over
40 percent of the world’s human population live near coastal areas (this will be important
when we discuss climate change and sea level rise later in the semester).

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College of Alameda
GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

Images above were generated by NASA in 2001 and 2002. Earth is often referred to as the
“blue planet” due to the overwhelming abundance of our ocean.

How Many Oceans Are There on Earth?

Before we go further, let’s clarify one thing – the number of oceans that exist on Earth. You
may have heard there are four oceans (Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, and Arctic), or five oceans
(Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, Arctic, and Antarctic), or seven oceans (Arctic, North Atlantic,
South Atlantic, North Pacific, South Pacific, Indian, and Antarctic). Technically there is only
ONE ocean on Earth. This ocean can be subdivided into four, five, seven (or more) sub-
oceans. There is only one ocean because the sub-oceans are all connected. In other words,
the Atlantic Ocean is connected to the Pacific Ocean, which is connected to the Indian
Ocean, which are all connected to the Arctic and Antarctic oceans. Spin this Google Earth
globe around and examine the connectedness of the ocean.

Moderate Climates

As terrestrial creatures, humans think of the importance of the planet’s land surfaces, yet
Earth is a planet consisting of 70 percent water. From space, the dominance of water is
evident because most of it is stored in Earth’s ocean1.

Earth would not be the same planet without its ocean. The ocean, along with the
atmosphere, keep Earth’s surface temperatures fairly constant worldwide. Some places on
Earth reach as cold as -89.2 degrees Celsius (or -128.6 degrees Fahrenheit), whereas other
places reach as hot as 56.7 degrees Celsius (or 134.1 degrees Fahrenheit). On other
planets that do not have a large body of water, like Mercury for example, temperatures
ranges from -180 degrees Celsius (or -292 degrees Fahrenheit) to 430 degrees Celsius (or
806 degrees Fahrenheit).

The ocean, along with the atmosphere, distributes heat around the planet. The ocean
absorbs heat near the equator and then transport that solar energy to polar regions. The
ocean also moderates climate within a region. What I mean by this is if we look at places at
the same latitude, the temperature range is smaller along coastal areas compared to areas
farther inland. Along coastal areas, summer temperatures are not as hot, and winter
temperatures are not as cold, because water takes a long time to heat up or cool down.
Here is a great, short video/animation depicting how the ocean regulates temperature on
Earth.

Biologically Rich

The ocean is an essential part of Earth’s water cycle. Since the ocean covers so much of the
planet, this means that most evaporation comes from the ocean, and most precipitation
falls on the ocean.

The ocean is also home to an enormous amount of life. That is, it has tremendous
biodiversity. Tiny ocean plants, called phytoplankton, create the base of a food web that
supports all sorts of life forms. Marine life makes up the majority of all biomass on
Earth. Biomass is the total mass of living organisms in a given area. These organisms
supply us with food and even the oxygen created by marine plants.

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College of Alameda
GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

Fun fact: scientists estimate that roughly half of the oxygen production on Earth
comes from the ocean. And the majority of this production is from oceanic plankton
– drifting plants, algae, and some bacteria that can photosynthesize. Learn more
about this here.

Image above is from the coral reef near Havelock Island (in the Andaman Islands, a
territory of India).

Composition of Ocean Water

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College of Alameda
GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

Ocean water is a complex mixture of organic and inorganic substances. Water is a polar
molecule, meaning it can dissolve many substances such as salts, sugars, acids, bases, and
organic molecules. Where does the salt in seawater come from? As fresh water moves
through rock and soil on land (such as flowing rivers and streams) it dissolves and picks up
materials, such as salts. This is the consequence of weathering (more on weathering and
erosion in a later chapter/lecture).

Salts comprise, on average, about 3.5 percent of the mass of ocean water, but the salt
content or salinity is different in different locations (i.e., some areas of the ocean are
saltier than others). Ocean water generally ranges from 3.3 percent to 3.8 percent salinity 2.
Let’s compare these percentages to some other categories:

 Average salinity of freshwater lakes, rivers, and streams is 1 percent salinity or

less2.
 Brackish water (which is a mixture of fresh water and seawater) is below 3.3
percent salinity. Estuaries typically have brackish water2.
 Hypersaline water, or brine, is very salty and has an average salinity above 3.8
percent. This can be found in tidepools, for example. During low tide, a tidepool that
is not connected to the ocean can become hypersaline when evaporating water
leaves salts behind2. This can also occur in lakes, such as the Dead Sea.
o The Dead Sea has 30 percent salinity – nearly nine times the average salinity
of ocean water. It is called the Dead Sea because almost nothing can survive
within it due to its high salt content (some bacteria and microbial fungi are
present). For comparison, the Salton Sea in California is 4.4 percent salinity.

So, thinking geographically, the where and why of ocean salinity depends on a few factors –
precipitation, evaporation, runoff, and ice freezing and melting. Salinity will be higher in
areas with less incoming fresh water and higher evaporation rates. And salinity will be
lower in areas in more incoming fresh water and lower evaporation rates. Take a look at
this animation that shows the distribution of salinity in the ocean. Areas in red, orange, and
yellow represent higher salinity. Areas in light blue and dark blue represent lower salinity
(and green is average). Why do we care about the concentrations of salinity in ocean?
Because this is one of the major factors that impacts ocean currents, specifically deep
ocean currents. And ocean currents are responsible for storing and transporting heat,
carbon, nutrients, and maintaining marine ecosystems.

Differences in water density, or weight, are responsible for deep ocean currents. This will
be discussed further, starting on pg. 11. Heavier (i.e., denser water) sinks, while lighter,
less dense water rises or floats.

Water density increases if:

 salinity increases (i.e., more salt is added to the water)
 temperature decreases (same with air, heavier water will sink)
 and/or pressure increases (i.e., depth)

Layers of the Ocean

The average depth of the ocean is about 3,699 meters (or 12,100 feet). The deepest part of
the ocean is called the Challenger Deep and is located beneath the western Pacific Ocean
in the southern end of the Mariana Trench, which runs several hundred kilometers

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GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

southwest of Guam3. Challenger deep is approximately 10,935 meters (or 35,876 feet) deep
and was named after the HMS Challenger, the ship that first explored the deep sea
successfully on a global scale (from 1873-1876).

To better understand regions of the ocean, scientists define the water column by depth.
They divide the entire ocean into two zones vertically, based on light level (see image
above and on the following page). Large lakes are also divided into similar, vertical regions.
Sunlight only penetrates the sea surface to a depth of about 200 meters (or about 656 feet),
creating the photic zone (consisting of the Sunlight Zone and Twilight Zone). Organisms
that photosynthesize depend on sunlight for food and so are restricted to the photic zone.
Since phytoplankton, supply nearly all the energy and nutrients to the rest of the marine
food web, most other marine organisms live in or at least visit the photic zone. In
the aphotic zone (consisting of the Midnight Zone and the Abyss) there is not enough light
for photosynthesis. The aphotic zone makes up the majority of the ocean, but has a
relatively small amount of its life, both in the type of diversity and in numbers 1.

Take a look at the National Weather Service for further details and information on
the layers of the ocean. There is also a visual of these layers on the following page.

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College of Alameda
GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

Waves

Waves form on the ocean and lakes because energy from the wind is transferred to the
water. The stronger the wind, the longer it blows, and the larger the area of water over
which it blows (also known as the fetch), the larger the waves are likely to be1.

The essential parts of a wave are its wavelength (the horizontal distance between two
crests or two troughs), its amplitude (the vertical distance between a trough and a crest),
and its velocity (the speed at which wave crests move across the water) 1. See diagram on
the following page.

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College of Alameda
GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

Relatively small waves move at up to about 10 km/h or about 6.2 miles per hour and arrive
on a shore about once every 3 seconds. Huge waves move about five times faster (over 50
km/h or 31 miles per hour), but because their wavelengths are so much longer, they arrive
less frequently – about once every 14 seconds1.

As a wave moves across the surface of the water, the water itself mostly moves up and
down and only moves a small amount in the direction of wave motion. As this happens, a
point on the water surface describes a circle with a diameter that is equal to the wave
amplitude. This motion is also transmitted to the water underneath, and the water is
disturbed by a wave to a depth of approximately one-half of the wavelength.
The one-half wavelength depth of disturbance of the water beneath a wave is known as
the wave base. Since ocean waves rarely have wavelengths greater than 200 meters (or
656.168 feet), and the open ocean is several thousand meters deep, the wave base does not
frequently interact with the bottom of the ocean. However, as waves approach the much
shallower water near the shore, they start to “feel” the bottom, and they are affected by
that interaction. The wave “orbits” are both flattened and slowed by dragging, and the
implications are that the wave amplitude (height) increases, and the wavelength decreases
(the waves become much steeper). The ultimate result of this is that the waves lean
forward, and eventually breaks1.

Here's a good webpage and brief video that further explains the description above – i.e.,
how waves move energy, not water.

Waves usually approach the shore at an angle, and this means that one part of the wave
“feels” the bottom sooner than the rest of it, so the part that feels the bottom first slows
down first. In open water, these waves had wavelengths close to 100 meters. In the shallow
water closer to shore, the wavelengths decreased to around 50 meters (or 164.042 feet),
and in some cases, even less. Even though they bend and become nearly parallel to shore,
most waves still reach the shore at a small angle, and as each one arrives, it pushes water
along the shore, creating what is known as a longshore current within the surf zone (the
areas where waves are breaking)1.

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College of Alameda
GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

Another significant effect of waves reaching the shore at an angle is that when they wash
up onto the beach, they do so at an angle, but when that same wave water washes back
down the beach, it moves straight down the slope of the beach. The upward-moving water,
known as the swash, pushes sediment particles along the beach, while the downward-
moving water, the backwash, brings them straight back. With every wave that washes up
and then down the beach, particles of sediment are moved along the beach in a zigzag
pattern.

The combined effects of sediment transport within the surf zone by the longshore current
and sediment movement along the beach by swash and backwash is known as longshore
drift (see diagram below). Longshore drift moves a tremendous amount of sediment along
coasts (both the ocean and large lakes) around the world, and it is responsible for creating
a variety of depositional features (more on this in our weathering and erosion
chapter/lecture).

A rip current (see diagram below) is another type of current that develops in the nearshore
area and has the effect of returning water that has been pushed up to the shore by
incoming waves. Rip currents flow straight out from the shore and are fed by the longshore
currents. They die out quickly just outside the surf zone but can be dangerous to swimmers
who get caught in them. If part of a beach does not have a strong unidirectional longshore
current, the rip currents may be fed by longshore currents going in both directions.

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College of Alameda
GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

On the open sea, waves generally appear choppy because waves from many directions are
interacting with each other. Where crests converge with other crests,
called constructive interference, they add together producing peaks, a process referred
to as wave amplification. Constructive interference of troughs produces hollows. Where
crests converge with troughs, they cancel each other out, called destructive
interference. As waves approach shore and begin to make frictional contact with the
seafloor (i.e., water depth is a half wavelength or less) they begin to slow down, but the
energy carried by the wave remains the same, so they build up higher. The water moves in
a circular motion as the wave passes, with the water that feeds each circle being drawn
from the trough in front of the advancing wave. As the wave encounters shallower water at
the shore, there is eventually insufficient water in front of the wave to supply a complete
circle, and the crest pours over creating a breaker 1. See the diagram below, which depicts
the difference between constructive an destructive interference.

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College of Alameda
GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

Tsunamis

A particular type of wave is generated by any energetic event affecting the sea floor, such
as earthquakes, submarine landslides, and volcanic eruptions. Such waves are
called tsunamis and, in the case of earthquakes, are created when a portion of the
seafloor is suddenly elevated by movement in the crustal rocks below that are involved in
the earthquake. The water is suddenly lifted, and a wave train spreads out in all directions
from the mound carrying enormous energy and traveling very fast (hundreds of miles per
hour)1. See this short video.

Tsunamis may pass unnoticed in the open ocean because the wavelength is very long and
the wave height is shallow. However, as the wave approaches the shore, each wave makes
contact with the shallow seafloor, friction increases, and the wave slows down. Wave
height builds up, and the wave strikes the shore as a wall of water a hundred or more feet
high. The massive wave may sweep inland well beyond the beach. This is called the
tsunami run-up, which destroys structures far inland. Tsunamis can deliver a catastrophic
blow to anyone standing at the beach as the water in the trough in front of it is drawn back
toward the tsunami wave, exposing the seafloor. Curious and unsuspecting people may run
out to see exposed offshore sea life only to be overwhelmed when the breaking crest hits.
This is why you should always run AWAY from the ocean (back inland) if you are standing
on a beach and the water suddenly, dramatically recedes.

Tides

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College of Alameda
GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

Tides are the daily rise and fall of sea level at any given place. The pull of the Moon’s
gravity on Earth is the primary cause of tides, and the pull of the Sun’s gravity on Earth is
the secondary cause. The Moon has a more significant effect because, although it is much
smaller than the Sun, it is much closer. The Moon’s pull is about twice that of the Sun’s 1.

To understand the tides, it is easiest to start with the effect of the Moon on Earth. As the
Moon revolves around our planet, its gravity pulls Earth toward it. The lithosphere is
unable to move much but the gravity pulls the water above it, and a bulge is created. This
bulge is the high tide beneath the Moon. The Moon’s gravity then pulls the Earth toward it,
leaving the water on the opposite side of the planet behind. This creates a second-high tide
bulge on the opposite side of Earth from the Moon. These two water bulges on opposite
sides of the Earth aligned with the Moon are the high tides (see image below).

Since so much water is pulled into the two high tides, low tides form between the two high
tides. As the Earth rotates beneath the Moon, a single spot will experience two high tides
and two low tides every day.

The tidal range is the difference between the ocean level at high tide and the ocean at low
tide. The tidal range in a location depends on some factors, including the slope of the
seafloor. Water, for example, moves a greater distance on a gentle slope rather than on a
steep slope.

Surface Currents

Ocean water moves in predictable ways along the ocean surface. Surface currents can
flow for thousands of kilometers and can reach depths of hundreds of meters. These

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College of Alameda
GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

surface currents do not depend on the weather; they remain unchanged even in large
storms because they depend on factors that do not change1.

Surface currents are created by three things: global wind patterns, the rotation of the
earth, and the shape of the ocean basins. Surface currents are extremely important
because they distribute heat around the planet and are a significant factor influencing
climate around the globe. Take a look at this excellent GIS story map on what causes
ocean currents around the world.

What influences the ocean’s surface currents? One factor are winds. As we discussed
previously, global winds blow in the same directions all the time and are related to the
unequal heating of Earth by the Sun, that is that more solar radiation strikes the equator
than the polar regions, and the rotation of the Earth called the Coriolis effect. Water in the
surface currents is pushed in the direction of the significant wind belts:
 Trade winds are consistent winds that flow east to west between the equator and
30 degrees North and 30 degrees South
 Westerlies are winds that flow west to east in the middle latitudes
 Polar easterlies are winds that flow east to west between 50 degrees and 60
degrees north and south of the equator and the north and south pole

Wind is not the only factor that affects ocean currents. The Coriolis effect (discussed in
Chapter/Lecture 3: Weather Processes and Phenomena) describes how Earth’s rotation
steers winds and surface ocean currents. The Coriolis effect causes freely moving objects
to appear to move to the right in the Northern Hemisphere and to the left in the Southern
Hemisphere. The objects themselves are moving straight, but the Earth is rotating beneath
them, so they seem to bend or curve. This causes large ocean currents to rotate clockwise
in the Northern Hemisphere and counterclockwise in the Southern Hemispheres.

Take a few minutes and explore this map of the top 25 of the world’s wind driven currents.
You can view these all at once (which is the default setting) or you can uncheck the “All
Currents” box and then check the box for each of the individual currents. The colors
indicate temperature – red currents are “warm” currents, and blue are “cold” currents. See
if you can identify the one closest to you and determine whether it is a warm-water current
or cold-water current (this may be something you want to discuss in the image discussion)!

Deep Currents

If you take a look further down towards the sea floor, you would see that the ocean
circulates in a very different pattern from the surface. This is known as deep ocean
circulation (see image below). Remember those density differences discussed back on pg.
4? Thermohaline circulation drives deep ocean circulation. Thermo means heat and
haline refers to salinity. Differences in temperature and salinity change the density of
seawater. So, thermohaline circulation is the result of density differences in water masses
because of their different temperature and salinity. In the map on the next page, the color
differences represent different temperatures (i.e., red is warmer water and blue is colder
water).

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College of Alameda
GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

What is the temperature and salinity of very dense water? Lower temperature and higher
salinity yield the densest (i.e., heaviest) water. When a volume of water is cooled, the
molecules move less vigorously, so the same number of molecules takes up less space, and
the water is denser. If salt is added to a volume of water, there are more molecules in the
same volume, so the water is denser1.

Changes in temperature and salinity of seawater take place at the surface. Water becomes
dense near the poles, for example. Cold polar air cools the water and lowers its
temperature, increasing its salinity. Freshwater freezes out of seawater to become sea ice,
which also increases the salinity of the remaining water. This frigid, very saline water is
very dense and sinks, a process called downwelling1. Two things then happen. The dense
water pushes deeper water out of its way, and that water moves along the bottom of the
ocean. This deep water mixes with less dense water as it flows. Surface currents move
water into the space vacated at the surface where the dense water sank. Water also sinks
into the deep ocean off of Antarctica. Since unlimited amounts of water cannot sink to the
bottom of the ocean, water must rise from the deep ocean to the surface somewhere. This
process is called upwelling.

Generally, upwelling occurs along the coast when the wind blows water strongly away from
the shore. This leaves a void that is filled with deep water that rises to the surface.
Upwelling is extremely important where it occurs. During its time on the bottom, the cold
deep water has collected nutrients that have fallen through the water column. Upwelling
brings those nutrients to the surface. That nutrient supports the growth of plankton and
forms the base of a vibrant ecosystem. California, South America, South Africa, and the
Arabian Sea all benefit from offshore upwelling1.

Upwelling also takes place along the equator between the North and South Equatorial
Currents. Winds blow the surface water north and south of the equator so deep water
undergoes upwelling. The nutrients rise to the surface and support a great deal of life in
the equatorial ocean1.

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College of Alameda
GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

Check out this excellent GIS story map on how ocean currents impact the world. Scroll
down as you read, and you can zoom in and out to view the maps better.

Topology of the Sea Floor

As mentioned previously, the ocean covers about 71 percent of Earth’s surface and holds
about 97 percent of Earth’s water. Ocean water is critical to plate tectonics, to volcanism,
and of course, to life on Earth. Earth has had oceans for a very long time, dating back to
the point where the surface had cooled enough to allow liquid water, only a few hundred
million years after Earth’s formation. At that time there were no continental rocks, so the
water that was here was likely spread out over the surface in one giant (but relatively
shallow) ocean1.

The topography (i.e., elevation) of the northern Atlantic Ocean is shown in the map below.
The essential features are the extensive continental shelves less than 250 meters deep
(pink); the vast deep ocean plains between 4,000 and 6,000 meters deep (light and dark
blue).

The topography of the Atlantic Ocean sea floor between 0° and 50° north (above). Red and
yellow colors indicate less than 2,000 meters depth; green less than 3,000 meters; blue
4,000 meters to 5,000 meters; and purple greater than 6,000 meters.

The deepest parts of the ocean are within the subduction trenches (more on this in a later
chapter when we get to plate tectonics), and the deepest of these, as mentioned previously,
is the Mariana Trench in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. Other trenches in the

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GEOG 1: Physical Geography Professor Carmichael

southwestern Pacific are over 10,000 meters deep; the Japan Trench is over 9,000 meters
deep, and the Puerto Rico and Chile-Peru Trenches are over 8,000 meters deep.

Now, you may be thinking about seafloor mapping. I mean, who isn’t at this point, right??
You may have heard at some point in your life that we (as humans and scientists) know
more about the surface of the Moon than we do about the seafloor. And that is true to a
certain extent - we have better (i.e., more detailed) maps of the Moon than we do of the
bottom of the ocean. The reason for this? It’s simply because it’s more challenging to get
the right equipment to the bottom of the ocean than it is to the Moon. Seriously. Consider
lighting, pressure, fuel, vastness, etc. It is challenging.

Here is an article that discusses some of those technology limitations.

So, how much of the seafloor have we mapped? Well, it depends on the level of detail you
are interested in. Technically we have an idea of what exists on nearly all of the seafloor
(i.e., knowledge we’ve inferred using satellites and altimeter instruments). The technology
needed to map the seafloor by modern standards though has only existed very recently.
There is currently a project, the Nippon Foundation-GEBCO Seabed 2030 Project dedicated
to the creation of a full map of the ocean floor by 2030. This project was launched in 2017
and has successfully mapped about 25% (as of April 2023) of the ocean floor. Prior to this
project, the level of detailed imagery available has been limited. The best resolution
available for any portion of the seafloor that was already mapped was over a kilometer.
This project aims for a resolution of at least 100 meters everywhere. To give you some
perspective, there are about 140 million square miles of ocean floor. This is an intense
undertaking and an exciting project, to say the least. If any of you are interested in
Oceanography now would be the perfect time to learn more – there is about to be an
eruption of knowledge in this field (in less than 10 years when this project is
complete).Why might it be beneficial to have better seafloor maps? Are there negatives that
you can think of? This may be something you want to explore in the image discussion….

1
Dastrup, A., Ramjoue, G. (2020). “Physical Geography and Natural Disasters”. Oceans and Coastal Environments.
https://slcc.pressbooks.pub/physicalgeography/front-matter/introduction/
2
“Exploring Our Fluid Earth.” Measuring Salinity | Manoa.Hawaii.Edu/ExploringOurFluidEarth,
manoa.hawaii.edu/exploringourfluidearth/physical/density-effects/measuring-salinity. Accessed 7 Oct. 2023.
3
US Department of Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “How Deep Is the Ocean?”
NOAA’s National Ocean Service, 30 Sept. 2015, oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/oceandepth.html.

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