FASTNEt - Fluxes Across the Sloping Topography of the North East Atlantic

浅海，即陆架海，几乎包围了地球上所有的陆地。陆架海的平均深度为数百米，而海洋的平均深度接近4公里。陆架海可能窄至几公里，也可能宽至数百公里，它们加在一起只占世界水域的十分之一。然而，它们对人类的影响远远超出了它们本身的规模。英国和西欧周围的陆架海特别宽（10到100公里）和浅（约150米）；它们被强烈的潮汐和西风所包围，并受到东北大西洋温暖海水的滋养。从最小的植物，浮游植物，到鱼类，英国大陆架海的生物生产力很高：世界上十分之九的商业鱼类捕捞来自大陆架海。这种高生产力在很大程度上是由营养丰富的海水向大陆架海的运动所推动的。然而，阶梯式海底斜坡（大陆架边缘），标志着海洋与大陆架之间的狭窄区域，减少了水从海洋到大陆架的运动（反之亦然）；主要的洋流不喜欢穿过倾斜的海底。然而，当洋流受到风或海底的影响，或者变化速度比每天快，或者距离缩短到几十公里时，这种对交换的限制就会被打破。因此，陆架边缘被视为控制海洋和陆架之间交换的门户，而这种交换的守门人是快速变化的水流，或者位于海洋的最表面或最底部。这使得交易的“把关人”难以衡量，因此我们对“把关人”过程在不同季节、不同年份之间的变化知之甚少。FASTNEt将汇集英国最强大的物理海洋学家团队，利用最先进的观测技术和一系列预测建模方法来应对这一挑战。两艘科考船将在卫星跟踪漂流浮标、荧光染料和无人驾驶小型潜艇的帮助下，研究守门人过程的细节。仪器将在冬天留在原地记录冬季风暴带来的变化，一支无人驾驶潜艇舰队将在没有船只可以操作的条件下访问这些仪器，这样就填补了我们理解上的巨大空白。我们将从潜艇、漂流者、卫星图片和船只收集信息，测试我们对看门人过程的理解，改进设计来模拟这些过程的模型。然后，我们将与国家海洋预报中心合作，帮助提高我们对英国周围海域状况的预报能力。

Shallow seas, the Shelf Seas, surround almost all of the Earth's land masses. On average shelf seas are hundreds of meters deep, compared to the average depth of the ocean of nearly four kilometres. Shelf Seas may be as narrow as a few kilometres, or as wide as hundreds of kilometres and together they occupy only a tenth of the watery part of the world. Yet they exert an effect on humanity far out of proportion to their mere size. Shelf Seas around the UK and western Europe are particularly wide (10s to 100s km) and shallow (around 150m); they are beset by strong tides, westerly winds, and fed by the warm waters of the NE Atlantic. From the smallest plant life, phyto-plankton, to the fish, UK Shelf Seas are highly biologically productive: nine tenths of the world's commercial fish catches come from shelf seas. This high productivity is fuelled to the greatest extent by the movement of nutrient-rich ocean waters onto the Shelf Seas. However, the step seabed slope (the Shelf Edge), which marks a narrow zone separating ocean from shelf, acts to reduce the movement of water from ocean to shelf (and visa versa); major ocean currents do not like to cross a sloping seabed. This restriction to exchange, however, breaks down when oceanic flows feel the wind or the seabed, or vary more rapidly than daily or over distances shorter that a few tens of kilometres. The shelf edge is therefore seen as the controlling gateway to exchange between ocean and shelf, and the gatekeepers of that exchange are flows which change quickly, or lie at the very surface or at the very bottom of the sea. This makes the gatekeepers of exchange difficult to measure, and as a result we know very little about how the gatekeeper processes change from one season to another and from one year to another.FASTNEt will bring together the strongest possible UK team of Physical Oceanographers to tackle this challenge using state-of-the art observational technologies, and a range of predictive modelling approaches.Two research ship expeditions will study the details of the gatekeeper processes, aided by satellite tracked drifting buoy, fluorescent dyes, and unmanned mini-submarines. Instruments will be left in place over winter to record changes brought by winter storms, and a fleet of unmanned submarines will visit these instruments in conditions no ship could operate in, and is so doing fill a huge gap in our understanding.We will take the information gathered from the submarines, drifters, satellite pictures and ships and test our understanding of the gatekeeper processes, improve models designed to simulate these processes. We will then work with the National Centre for Ocean Forecasting to help improve our ability to provide forecasts of the conditions of the seas surrounding the United Kingdom.