Zooming in shows salinity and dissolved oxygen are fluctuating heavily alongside the tidal cycle. Can you determine what is causing this?
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Q&A: Measurements Along the Tidal Cycle
Zooming in shows salinity and dissolved oxygen are fluctuating heavily alongside the tidal cycle. Can you determine what is causing this?
Tech Tip: Troubleshooting a misfiring bottle
Tech Tip: Troubleshooting a misfiring bottle The SBE 32 and SBE 55 water samplers utilize a unique electromagnetic design to reliably capture water. Did you know that the latches are also dishwasher safe? Watch this video to learn how to remove and clean water sampler...
Tech Tip: Connector Care
An instrument’s bulkhead connector is often its only pathway for communication. Although they are robust, failure to care for the connector can quickly put an end of to a research expedition. Lean how to properly clean and maintain your instrument’s connectors with...
Q&A: Moored Data Excursions
February 2020 Newsletter The data above came from a HydroCAT-EP multiparameter probe moored in an estuary near Savannah, Georgia. The highlighted section shows a sudden change in the temperature and salinity data that lasted for approximately 4 days, and continued...
Paperclips – Valuable Troubleshooting Tools?
January 2020 Newsletter Paperclips are handy, but have you used one to troubleshoot an oceanographic sensor? When you’re unable to communicate with your instrument, the humble paperclip is one of the first tools that Sea-Bird Scientific’s technical support team...
Q&A: Negative Fluorescence Data
December 2019 Newsletter Fluorescence is the light emitted by a particle after excitation from another light source. Sea-Bird Scientific fluorometers are widely used to measure fluorescence from chlorophyll as a method of measuring primary productivity. The figure...
Q&A: Erratic Profiles
November 2019 Newsletter The data above come from a profiling CTD, deployed in sea conditions that caused approximately 1-meter ship heave. Two things stick out – relatively unchanging salinity data during the downcast, and noisy data during the upcast (shown in light...
pH Training: Past and Present
October 2019 Newsletter On October 31st, Sea-Bird Scientific presented a hands on technical training at the OCEANS ’19 conference in Seattle, WA. If you could not attend, watch a recording of our live webinar, presented on July 18th 2019, outlining how our latest line...
Q&A: Unusual Test Bath Data – a Cautionary Tale
September 2019 Newsletter These data show a small but rather catastrophic deployment error. Shown above, pH and dissolved oxygen data before the highlighted area did not match bottle samples or nearby validation sensors, but data after the highlighted area accurately...
How many pH samples can you fit into a year?
How long can you really trust your sensor to sip energy from its batteries? Properly selecting the right sample interval must strike a balance between a high-resolution dataset and a complete time-series. After some quick calculations, we’ve found the optimal sample...
Explaining the ISFET pH Sensor
May 2019 Newsletter ISFET-based pH sensors have been used to measure pH in industrial settings for years (do you know the pH of your last beer?). It’s the adaptation of this technology for measuring ocean pH that makes the SeaFET V2 and SeapHOx V2 novel tools for the...
Featured Posts
Q&A: Regular Spikes in Salinity
Can’t see the animated gif? Click here. The salinity profile shown above was from an arctic deployment in rough seas. At a certain point, we see regular salinity spikes of about ± .01 psu in the upcast data. What’s unusual is the regularity and size of each spike –...
What is the STS Sensor?
If you are an autonomous vehicle, you never know what could be floating on the surface. From algal blooms to oil spills, the sea surface is the most likely place you’re going to find something to gum up your sensors. For autonomous systems like the global Argo...
BGC Sensors that Power Argo
Before the ocean robots of BGC-Argo adopted biogeochemical sensors, scientists leveraged the same instruments on shipboard and moored platforms (and still do today!). Just as the modern Argo CTD is based on traditional shipboard CTD designs, the sensors that power...