Development and Validation of a Submersible Oceanic Luminescent Analyzer of Reactive Intermediate Species (SOLARIS)

海洋的健康和功能受到一系列化学物质的生产和消费的控制。虽然稳定的化学物质可以通过传统的水收集方法和船上或实验室分析来测量，但这种方法不适用于寿命只有几个小时或更短的化学物质。由于它们的快速生产和消耗，这些活性化合物寿命很短，通常在海洋中以低水平存在；然而，他们对周围环境有着不成比例的巨大影响。事实上，人们逐渐认识到，这些短暂的反应性化学物质甚至可能对海洋的整体效率和健康至关重要。测量短寿命物种的固有困难严重限制了测量这些重要的化学物质，从而限制了预测它们对海洋及其生物健康的作用的能力。因此，这项研究将开发、建造并验证一种远程操作的水下化学传感器，该传感器将能够直接测量海洋中这些关键的活性化学物质。该仪器最初的设计和测试将使用过氧化氢和超氧化物作为目标，这两种活性氧（ROS）众所周知难以测量，但对海洋的健康和生物地球化学至关重要。该项目还将支持与波士顿绿色学院的合作教育工作，向高中生介绍深海仪器的世界及其对了解海洋的重要性。该项目旨在设计、开发和验证一种用于海洋研究的生物地球化学传感器，其形式是一种可潜水的海洋（化学）发光反应中间体分析仪（SOLARIS）。SOLARIS将先进的自适应流体系统与高灵敏度的光检测分析仪相结合，包括一个水下原位化学发光传感器。该仪器将扩展分析能力，使其能够描述迄今为止无法到达的环境，特别是深海中反应性化学物质的动力学特征。SOLARIS将代表四个模块的开发和集成，它们共同组成一个分析平台，能够在皮到纳米摩尔检测水平上校准原位测量。这些模块将包括定制设计的软件可控泵和阀歧管，允许仔细控制和实时修改流体传输和泵配置，以进行校准，背景测量和标准化。在水下光电探测系统的中心，将包括开发一个透明的、承受压力的蓝宝石流动电池，该电池将集成到一个包含高灵敏度光电倍增管的压力外壳中。这些系统将与用于进行校准和分析物衰减测量的积分分光光度计一起组成分析模块。SOLARIS将被配置和部署为一种玫瑰安装的“远洋模式”，用于检查沿海和近海水域的水柱动态，以及一种“底栖模式”，同时集成到一个潜水器上，用于对深海生物群落进行初步调查。这两个平台将作为综合科学计划的一部分进行验证，该计划将首次对超氧化物和过氧化氢进行原位测量，这项研究将使科学探索活性氧在控制全球海洋所有深度的元素循环、碳降解和生物健康方面的作用成为可能。

The health and function of the ocean is controlled by the production and consumption of a broad spectrum of chemicals. While stable chemical species can be measured using traditional methods of water collection and either shipboard or lab-based analyses, this approach is not amenable to chemicals that have lifetimes on the orders of hours or less. Due to their rapid production and consumption, these reactive compounds are short-lived and typically exist in low levels within the ocean; yet, they have a disproportionately large influence on their surrounding environment. In fact, there is an emerging recognition that these short-lived reactive chemicals may even be essential to the overall efficiency and health of the ocean. The intrinsic difficulty in measuring short-lived species has been a crippling constraint on measuring these important chemicals, and has thereby limited the ability to predict their role in the health of the ocean and its inhabitants. Thus, this research will develop, build and validate a remotely-operated, underwater chemical sensor that will enable direct measurements of these key reactive chemicals in the ocean. The instrument will be initially designed and tested using the targets hydrogen peroxide and superoxide, two reactive oxygen species (ROS) that are notoriously difficult to measure and yet are key to the health and biogeochemistry of the ocean. This project will also support collaborative education efforts with the Boston Green Academy by introducing high school students to the world of deep-sea instrumentation and its importance in understanding our ocean.This project aims to design, develop and validate a biogeochemical sensor for marine research, in the form of a submersible oceanic (chemi)luminescent analyzer of reactive intermediate species (SOLARIS). The SOLARIS will combine an advanced and adaptive fluidics system with a highly sensitive photodetection analyzer, comprising a submersible in situ chemiluminescent sensor. This instrument will extend analytical capabilities toward an ability to characterize the dynamics of reactive chemical species in environments that have been heretofore out of reach, in particular the deep sea. The SOLARIS will represent the development and integration of four modules, which together comprise an analytical platform capable of calibrated in situ measurements at pico- to nano-molar detection levels. These modules will include custom designed software controllable pumping and valve manifolds, allowing careful control and on-the-fly modification of fluid transfer and pumping configurations for calibration, background measurements, and standardization. At its hub the underwater photodetection system will involve the development of a transparent, pressure-bearing sapphire flow cell to be integrated into a pressure housing containing a highly sensitive photomultiplier tube. Together with an integral spectrophotometer used for conducting calibrations and analyte decay measurements, these systems will comprise the analytical module. The SOLARIS will be configured and deployed in both a rosette-mounted "pelagic mode" for examining water column dynamics in coastal and more offshore waters, as well as in a "benthic mode" while integrated onto a submersible vehicle for preliminary investigation of deep sea biological communities. Both of these platforms will be validated as part of an integrated science plan to make the first in situ measurements of superoxide and hydrogen peroxide - research that will enable scientific exploration of the role of ROS in controlling the elemental cycling, carbon degradation, and organismal health throughout all depths of the global ocean.