| Summary: | Dr. Donna Roberts, ocean acidification project leader at the Antarctic Climate and EcosystemsCooperative Research Center in Australia, has also worked with MBARI on creating a FOCE for anotherdeployment. In summer 2014, her team will send four FOCE units to the Antarctic sea floor to monitor how polarecosystems respond to higher carbon dioxide emissions. Such knowledge is particularly important,Roberts says, because cold waters absorb more carbon dioxide than warmer waters. This will be the first FOCE unit deployed under ice, and will be at risk of being struck by the bergy bitsof ice that break off over the summer. The chamber will have to be entrenched in the seafloor and builtwith materials that can withstand extreme cold. The Antarctic FOCE will study seafloor communities that are often overlooked, but are essential toreleasing vital nutrients back into the water to support the plankton that drive ocean productivity.
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