02-19-2023, 05:30 PM
A thread to delineate facts about the ocean, and things that can be done with these facts.
https://rwu.pressbooks.pub/webboceanogra...nutrients/
In particular: Currently working on a concept for a "silt-fruit", a kind of buoyant sea-sponge capable of traversing the abyssopelagic, all the way to the epipelagic (not my original idea). The creature would have a soft skeleton, and would have a lifecycle that would take it from the abyssal plains to the surface before spawning and spreading it's eggs to further fertilize deep-sea ooze deposits. Many hurdles in the way of this hypothetical creature- oxygen at more nutritious depths would not be in high concentrations, and non-existent sunlight means some form of chemosynthesis may need to be relied on during the maturation of the "silt-fruit". Uncertain as of yet if "decompression sickness" would affect a creature without lungs, but decompression has been shown to maim and kill other creatures brought up from similar depths.
[Image: https://letstalkscience.ca/sites/default...k=9U0Ac8z_]
"Why?"
A method by which the surface and seabed environs can interact with one another is a key component of unlocking a great deal of "stored energy" in the form of seafloor oozes, potentially greater in scope than the original industrial revolution. I have been trying to find the full diagram of seabed organic deposits, but almost all of the examples I've turned up are substandard. I believe Chud has a much better series of diagrams than I could hope to find.
There is already likely much interaction between the epipelagic and mesopelagic zones- crossing the barrier of the bathypelagic is the tricky component, specifically for surface creatures. "The Bends", or decompression sickness, does not just effect human beings- while ocean animals have some resistances to the sickness, skeletons of sperm whales have been recovered which display pits in their bones.
https://rwu.pressbooks.pub/webboceanogra...nutrients/
Quote:Comparisons of nutrient and dissolved oxygen profiles between the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans reveal some interesting differences (Figure 5.6.3). In general, the Atlantic has more dissolved oxygen but lower nutrient concentrations than the Pacific. Water masses form in the North Atlantic that are very cold and dense, so the water sinks to the bottom. This water will then spend the next thousand years or more moving along the seafloor from the Atlantic, to the Indian, and finally into the Pacific Ocean (see section 9.8). This water is initially oxygen-rich surface water, and as it sinks it brings oxygen to the deep seafloor. As the bottom water moves across the ocean basins, oxygen is removed through respiration and decomposition, and by the time it arrives in the Pacific it has been depleted of much of its oxygen. At the same time, decomposition of sinking organic matter adds nutrients to the deep water as it moves through the oceans, so nutrients accumulate and the Pacific water becomes nutrient-rich. Comparison of the ratios of oxygen to nutrients in the deep water can therefore provide an indication of the age of the water, i.e. how much time has passed since it initially sank from the surface in the North Atlantic. Water with a high oxygen and low nutrient content is relatively young, while older water will have less oxygen but higher nutrient concentrations.
In particular: Currently working on a concept for a "silt-fruit", a kind of buoyant sea-sponge capable of traversing the abyssopelagic, all the way to the epipelagic (not my original idea). The creature would have a soft skeleton, and would have a lifecycle that would take it from the abyssal plains to the surface before spawning and spreading it's eggs to further fertilize deep-sea ooze deposits. Many hurdles in the way of this hypothetical creature- oxygen at more nutritious depths would not be in high concentrations, and non-existent sunlight means some form of chemosynthesis may need to be relied on during the maturation of the "silt-fruit". Uncertain as of yet if "decompression sickness" would affect a creature without lungs, but decompression has been shown to maim and kill other creatures brought up from similar depths.
[Image: https://letstalkscience.ca/sites/default...k=9U0Ac8z_]
"Why?"
A method by which the surface and seabed environs can interact with one another is a key component of unlocking a great deal of "stored energy" in the form of seafloor oozes, potentially greater in scope than the original industrial revolution. I have been trying to find the full diagram of seabed organic deposits, but almost all of the examples I've turned up are substandard. I believe Chud has a much better series of diagrams than I could hope to find.
There is already likely much interaction between the epipelagic and mesopelagic zones- crossing the barrier of the bathypelagic is the tricky component, specifically for surface creatures. "The Bends", or decompression sickness, does not just effect human beings- while ocean animals have some resistances to the sickness, skeletons of sperm whales have been recovered which display pits in their bones.
