Collaborative Research: How to trace glacial meltwater in the ocean using ship-portable hydrographic analysis of dissolved neon and krypton

这一奖项将建造一种新的仪器来测量海洋中冰川融化的水。区分冰川融化和海冰、积雪融化和降雨是一项艰巨但重要的任务，因为冰川融化可能会带来重大而严重的后果，包括长期洪灾和海平面上升。冰川融化的原因和影响是一个观察和预测的挑战，因为它们在复杂和难以到达的地方展开：在几英里厚的冰下，在漂浮的冰架下，在一年中最冷的时候。该仪器的目标是将海洋学家测量和绘制海洋冰川融化图的能力提高300-400%，同时降低成本并提供近乎实时的结果。测量能力的增加将使人们能够比较南极洲和格陵兰岛冰盖地块冰川融化的区域和季节变化。该仪器将在罗德岛沿海水域进行现场验证，然后将用于测量南极半岛美国帕尔默站附近的冰川融化。罗德岛大学和SRI国际之间的伙伴关系是一种重要的公私伙伴关系，将鼓励使用私营部门的技术进行开放获取研究，并通过雇用本科生海洋工程师、支持硕士学生完成学位以及通过展示冰架模型及其与海洋的相互作用来招募环境传感技术方面的未来劳动力。该奖项旨在通过开发一种船用便携式“融水质谱仪”来推进对海洋中冰川融化的追踪，该仪器可以测量溶解在水和海水中的20Ne、22Ne和184Kr。这一进展是可能的，这要归功于气体净化方面的发展，但也要归功于测量霓虹灯质量电荷光谱的新分析能力，我们预计这将为分析带来新的精度。霓虹灯是一种在便携式惰性气体分析仪中难以分解的分析物。它将大大降低成本并扩大我们现有的样品容量，因为它消除了复杂的样品存储，以及在极地地区采集样品和随后在国内进行实验室分析之间的滞后时间。我们还预计，将MWMS技术直接纳入SRI国际水下质谱仪，使未来的AUV任务能够前往难以到达的地区，如崩解锋面和冰架洞穴。我们将通过在R/V奋进号上利用国际扶轮国家资助的船舶时间来测试和改进MWMS原型，并在玛格丽特湾进行全面的现场试验，作为RVIB Lm Goul上一年一度的Palmer LTER水文考察的一部分。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This award will build a new instrument to measure meltwater from glaciers in the ocean. Distinguishing glacier melt from sea ice, snow melt, and rain is a difficult but important task because melting glaciers threaten significant and acute consequences, including chronic flooding and sea level rise. The causes and impacts of melting glaciers are a challenge to observe and predict, because they unfold in complex and hard to reach places: beneath miles of ice, under floating ice shelves, and during the coldest times of the year. The objective of this instrument is to increase oceanographer's capacity to measure and map glacier melt in the ocean by 300-400%, while reducing costs and providing near real-time results. This increase in measurement capacity will permit comparison of regional and seasonal changes in the glacier melt from the ice-covered land masses of Antarctica and Greenland. The instrument will be field validated in Rhode Island coastal waters, and then it will be used to measure glacier melt near the US Palmer Station on the Antarctic Peninsula. The partnership between the University of Rhode Island and SRI international presents an important public-private partnership that will encourage the use of private-sector technology for open access research, and recruit the future workforce in environmental sensing technology by employing undergraduate ocean engineers, supporting a Masters student in the completion of their degree, and through exhibit models of glacial ice shelves and their interactions with the ocean. This award seeks to advance tracing of glacier melt in the ocean by developing a ship-portable "meltwater mass spectrometer" that measures 20Ne, 22Ne, and 184Kr dissolved in water and seawater. This advance is possible thanks to developments in gas purification, but also thanks to a new analytical capacity to measure the mass-to-charge spectrum of neon that we predict will bring new precision to the analysis. Neon is an analyte that has proven difficult to resolve in portable noble gas analyzers. It will dramatically reduce cost and expand our existing sample capacity by eliminating complicated sample storage and the lag time between sample collection in polar regions and subsequent laboratory analysis at home. We further anticipate that it will be straightforward to incorporate the MWMS technology into the SRI International underwater mass spectrometer, enabling future AUV missions to inaccessible regions, such as calving fronts and ice shelf cavities. We will test and refine the MWMS prototype by leveraging RI State funding for ship time on the R/V Endeavor and again during a full field trial in Marguerite Bay as part of the annual Palmer LTER hydrographic expedition aboard the RVIB LM Gould.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.