Metadata Report for BODC Series Reference Number 909955

• Metadata Summary

• Problem Reports

• Data Access Policy

• Narrative Documents

• Project Information

• Data Activity or Cruise Information

• Fixed Station Information

• BODC Quality Flags

• SeaDataNet Quality Flags

Metadata Summary

Problem Reports

No Problem Report Found in the Database

Data Access Policy

Public domain data

These data have no specific confidentiality restrictions for users. However, users must acknowledge data sources as it is not ethical to publish data without proper attribution. Any publication or other output resulting from usage of the data should include an acknowledgment.

The recommended acknowledgment is

"This study uses data from the data source/organisation/programme, provided by the British Oceanographic Data Centre and funded by the funding body."

Narrative Documents

RV Jan Mayen 6 CTD Data Documentation

Instrumentation

The CTD profiles were taken with a Meerestechnik OTS-1200 CTD incorporating pressure, conductivity and temperature sensors. An in-situ fluorometer and a rosette fitted with 5 litre Niskin bottles were included in the package.

The CTD was calibrated on a regular basis (approximately twice per year) using the facility at the University of Bergen. Additional salinity checks were made against OSI standard sea water.

Data Acquisition and Originator Processing

Data were logged on a PC and subsequently incorporated into the Tromsø data system. They were delivered to BODC binned to 1 metre with the channels temperature, salinity and nominal chlorophyll.

Post-Cruise Processing

Reformatting

The data, supplied in ASCII format, were transferred to the BODC internal format (PXF). The translation program also converted depths to pressures using an inverse of the standard UNESCO algorithm and applied a natural log transform to the nominal chlorophyll data to make them compatible with BODC's CTD processing system.

Editing

Using a custom in-house graphics editor, the downcasts were delimited by manually applying flags to the cycle number channel. In addition, any dubious data (such as equilibration artefacts at the surface) or spikes in the downcast channels were manually flagged suspect.

Once screened, the CTD downcasts were loaded into the OMEX database under the Oracle relational database management system.

Calibration

The data were supplied to BODC calibrated and no further modifications have been made to the temperature and salinity data.

The fluorometer was calibrated against fluorometrically assayed extracted chlorophyll data and the following relationship obtained:

This has been applied to the data held in the database.

Data Reduction

The final data set was produced by binning the calibrated data to 1 (casts shallower than 100 m) or 2 decibars. The binning algorithm excluded any data points flagged suspect and attempted linear interpolation over gaps up to 3 bins wide. If any gaps larger than this were encountered, the data in the gaps were set null.

Data Warnings

None.

Project Information

Ocean Margin EXchange (OMEX) I

Introduction

OMEX was a European multidisciplinary oceanographic research project that studied and quantified the exchange processes of carbon and associated elements between the continental shelf of western Europe and the open Atlantic Ocean. The project ran in two phases known as OMEX I (1993-1996) and OMEX II - II (1997-2000), with a bridging phase OMEX II - I (1996-1997). The project was supported by the European Union under the second and third phases of its MArine Science and Technology Programme (MAST) through contracts MAS2-CT93-0069 and MAS3-CT97-0076. It was led by Professor Roland Wollast from Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium and involved more than 100 scientists from 10 European countries.

Scientific Objectives

The aim of the Ocean Margin EXchange (OMEX) project was to gain a better understanding of the physical, chemical and biological processes occurring at the ocean margins in order to quantify fluxes of energy and matter (carbon, nutrients and other trace elements) across this boundary. The research culminated in the development of quantitative budgets for the areas studied using an approach based on both field measurements and modeling.

OMEX I (1993-1996)

The first phase of OMEX was divided into sub-projects by discipline:

• Physics
• Biogeochemical Cycles
• Biological Processes
• Benthic Processes
• Carbon Cycling and Biogases

This emphasises the multidisciplinary nature of the research.

The project fieldwork focussed on the region of the European Margin adjacent to the Goban Spur (off the coast of Brittany) and the shelf break off Tromsø, Norway. However, there was also data collected off the Iberian Margin and to the west of Ireland. In all a total of 57 research cruises (excluding 295 Continuous Plankton Recorder tows) were involved in the collection of OMEX I data.

Data Availability

Field data collected during OMEX I have been published by BODC as a CD-ROM product, entitled:

• OMEX I Project Data Set (two discs)

Further descriptions of this product and order forms may be found on the BODC web site.

The data are also held in BODC's databases and subsets may be obtained by request from BODC.

Data Activity or Cruise Information

Cruise

Complete Cruise Metadata Report is available here

Fixed Station Information

No Fixed Station Information held for the Series

BODC Quality Control Flags

The following single character qualifying flags may be associated with one or more individual parameters with a data cycle:

SeaDataNet Quality Control Flags

The following single character qualifying flags may be associated with one or more individual parameters with a data cycle: