The ocean is a continuous body of salt water that covers more than 70 percent of the Earth's surface. Ocean currents govern the world's weather and churn a kaleidoscope of life. Humans depend on these teeming waters for comfort and survival, but global warming and overfishing threaten Earth's largest habitat.
Oceans are areas of salty water that fill enormous basins on the Earth's surface. Oceans are deep as well as wide. On average an ocean is a little over two miles deep. But about 200 miles southwest of Guam in the Pacific Ocean, the water in the Mariana Trench is almost seven miles deep.
1a : the whole body of salt water that covers nearly three fourths of the surface of the earth. b : any of the large bodies of water (such as the Atlantic Ocean) into which the great ocean is divided. 2 : a very large or unlimited space or quantity.
Let's discuss the four common types of floating and rooted plants that live in the ocean:
- Kelp. Kelp beds are commonly found throughout colder ocean waters.
- Red Algae. Red algae have populated the warm, tropical waters of the world for more than 500 million years.
- Seagrass.
- Sargassum.
There is only one global ocean.Historically, there are four named ocean basins: the Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, and Arctic. However, most countries - including the United States - now recognize the Southern (Antarctic) as the fifth ocean basin. The Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian are the most commonly known.
An ocean current is a continuous, directed movement of sea water generated by a number of forces acting upon the water, including wind, the Coriolis effect, breaking waves, cabbeling, and temperature and salinity differences. Ocean currents are primarily horizontal water movements.
An oceanic climate, also known as a maritime climate, marine climate, marine west coast climate or temperate oceanic climate, is the Köppen classification of climate typical of west coasts in higher middle latitudes of continents, and generally features mild summers (relative to their latitude) and cool but not cold
If you have collected water from the ocean, boil it for five minutes to kill the microscopic life in the water. Taste the salt water. It is not necessary to drink any of it.
There are no borders within the water itself, rather the names were human constructs given to different oceans in regard to around which bodies of land they flow.
Ocean salt primarily comes from rocks on land. Rocks on land are the major source of salts dissolved in seawater. Rainwater that falls on land is slightly acidic, so it erodes rocks. This releases ions that are carried away to streams and rivers that eventually feed into the ocean.
A wide variety of organisms, including bacteria, protists, algae, plants, fungi, and animals, live in the sea, which offers a wide range of marine habitats and ecosystems, ranging vertically from the sunlit surface and shoreline to the great depths and pressures of the cold, dark abyssal zone, and in latitude from the
The average blue whale produces over 400 gallons of sperm when it ejaculates, but only 10% of that actually makes it into his mate. So 360 gallons are spilled into the ocean every time one unloads, and you wonder why the ocean is so salty
It provides a treasured source of recreation for humans. It is mined for minerals (salt, sand, gravel, and some manganese, copper, nickel, iron, and cobalt can be found in the deep sea) and drilled for crude oil. The ocean plays a critical role in removing carbon from the atmosphere and providing oxygen.
Three times as much oil is carried out to sea via runoff from our roads, rivers and drainpipes. More plastic than fish. Eight million metric tons: That's how much plastic we dump into the oceans each year. That's about 17.6 billion pounds — or the equivalent of nearly 57,000 blue whales — every single year.
It turns out, however, that water can also be moved without wind or tides, which is what happens in the deep ocean. There currents are set in motion by variations in water density caused by differences in temperature and salinity, a process called convection.
Ocean water is constantly in motion: north-south, east-west, alongshore, and vertically. Seawater motions are the result of waves, tides, and currents (Figure below). Ocean movements are the consequence of many separate factors: wind, tides, Coriolis effect, water density differences, and the shape of the ocean basins.
Large masses of moving water are called currents. In the oceans there are major surface currents, subsurface currents, and tidal currents.
By moving heat from the equator toward the poles, ocean currents play an important role in controlling the climate. Ocean currents are also critically important to sea life. They carry nutrients and food to organisms that live permanently attached in one place, and carry reproductive cells and ocean life to new places.
Waves are created by energy passing through water, causing it to move in a circular motion. The ocean is never still. Wind-driven waves, or surface waves, are created by the friction between wind and surface water. As wind blows across the surface of the ocean or a lake, the continual disturbance creates a wave crest.
Thermohaline circulation begins in the Earth's polar regions. When ocean water in these areas gets very cold, sea ice forms. These deep-ocean currents are driven by differences in the water's density, which is controlled by temperature (thermo) and salinity (haline). This process is known as thermohaline circulation.
Answer: The factors affecting the movement of ocean water are as follows:
- Temperature.
- The gravitational pull of sun and moon.
- Warm and cold currents.
- Wind.
Around the world, over 15 percent of our high-quality protein comes from the oceans — which also provide the primary and often only source of protein for one billion people.
