Unit 4 Test review Flashcards
4 major ocean basins
Atlantic, pacific, indian, arctic
What generates surface currents, how?
Friction between ocean surface/global winds (caused by the unequal heating of Earth’s surface, leading to different pressures, and causing the wind to blow from high to low pressure areas.) causes the ocean to move with the wind, causing surface ocean currents.
Identify two factors that affect the motion of surface ocean currents and explain how they do so.
The coriolis effect causes free moving objects, like the wind, to be deflected. This affects the motion of the surface ocean currents because it helps determine where the ocean currents go. Continents also affect the motion of surface ocean currents because when the currents hit the continents, they cannot go into the continent, so instead they continue going the same way they were going, but along the coast.
Define the Great Pacific “Garbage Patch”.
It is a collection of lots of trash, especially plastic, that has ended up in the pacific ocean gyre, because the gyre sucks in the plastic and other trash, not allowing it to leave. It is taken by ocean currents to the gyre, where it stays for a long time. It is so huge that it takes up 1.6 million square kilometers.
Identify the latitudes and side of continents affected by warm vs. cold currents.
The east side of the continent almost always has warmer currents, whereas the west side almost always has the cold currents. Warm ocean currents happen around the equator at 0 degrees and the further from the equator you get, closer to the poles (60 degrees North and South), the cooler the ocean currents become.
Identify the cause of the convergence of debris in ocean garbage patches.
currents carry warm water to cooler areas and vice versa, so it takes the plastic with it.
Explain how the ocean redistributes heat around the planet.
Earth unequally heated, different pressures, wind goes from high to low pressure, warm currents to cold ones bc wind blows them, heat redistributed.
Identify the source(s) of the Great Pacific “Garbage Patch”.
80% of the trash in the Garbage Patch is from the land, not the sea. Thai trash comes from runoffs, blown from landfills, and simply dumped into the ocean. The 20% that comes from the sea is mostly from nets and things that fall off the ships.
Explain why the Great Pacific “Garbage Patch” is a concern for the marine environment.
all of this plastic pollutes the ocean and marine animals mistake the plastic for food and consume it, harming and possibly killing them. They could also get stuck in bigger pieces of plastic, harming them even more.
Describe the life cycle of plastics and current limitations within it. Explain how these limitations lead to major environmental impacts.
enter into earth, 10% of plastics in use are able to be recycled by mechanical recycling and chemical recycling, 90% of plastics are not able to be recycled.
When plastic goes into the ocean, it is harmful to marine life because they mistake it for food and then possibly choke or die from it. In the air, the plastics pollute the air and cause climate change. Human health is impacted by those who work with plastics and use plastics, which is most of the world.
How are microplastics effecting the environment?
These are negatively affecting the environment because marine animals mistake them for food and eat them or get trapped in them. Then, when humans eat these marine animals, we are also eating teh microplastics that are in those animals, harming our health too.
Microplastics, primary and secondary
Microplastics are less than 5 mm, so small they can be transported by the wind, and found in fundamental marine organisms like zooplankton. Primary microplastics are always under 5 mm, whereas secondary microplastics can become larger than that. Primary microplastics are found in cosmetics, clothing, and raw materials, whereas secondary microplastics are found in almost everything from food wrappers to tires to shoes to nets. Finally, primary microplastics originated at a small scale for a specific purpose, whereas secondary microplastics originate from a variety of sources.
Compare and contrast bioaccumulation and biomagnification.
Bioaccumulation is the process by which toxins enter the food web by building up in an organism, whereas biomagnification is the process by which toxins are passed from one trophic level to the next in a food web, increasing in amount as they go.
Identify two different types of POPs (Persistent Organic Pollutants) and explain why these chemicals can still be found in the environment today regardless of bans in the 1970s and 1980s.
Two different types of POP’s are DDT and PCBs.
persist in the environment for a long time, they move within water, making it harder to go away, and they dissolve into fatty tissues of living organisms,
Using the great garbage patch, the life cycles of plastics and bioaccumulation + biomagnification as examples, justify the claim: humans are detrimentally impacting marine ecosystems and perpetuating a changing climate.
Humans are using tons of plastics that end up in the ocean, including at the great garbage patch, where miles of plastic have accumulated. The sun, microbes and oxidation breaks then are able to break these plastics smaller and smaller until they become microplastics. When these microplastics become small enough, they eventually enter the food chain, so marine animals start to eat them. Additionally, plastics connect to POP’s, a toxic that marine animals consume, so when marine animals mistake plastics for food and eat it, they are also increasing the concentration of POP that they have. This means that microplastics biomagnify and bioaccumulate with POP’s as they go up the food chain. Separately, because plastics have such a long life cycle, they stay in the ocean, harming marine animals, for a very long time. The great garbage patch, the life cycles of plastics and bioaccumulation and biomagnification all lead to negatively impacting marine ecosystems. Finally, with all this plastic in the ocean, it is harder for the ocean to absorb CO2, which makes the environment warmer, impacting climate change.
Define density (including its unit) and include the equation used to calculate it. Be able to solve novel density problems for any missing variable.
Density is how dense an object is. It is measured in g/cm³. The equation for calculating density is mass/volume. The equation for mass is density x volume and the equation for volume is mass/density.
Identify the relationship between temperature, salinity and density of ocean water. Explain how each of these vary with latitude.
To start off, the relationship between surface temperature and density is very clear, the higher the surface temperature, the lower the density. This is shown in the graph we did related to this question. Additionally, the areas with the lowest density (30 degrees North and South) are in regions that experience direct sunlight, making the average temperatures higher, leading to more evaporation. Because of this, the salinity here is highest. This means that increasing salinity and increasing the temperature will increase the density of the water.
Describe how differing salinity and temperature throughout the ocean results in layering.
When the ocean becomes cooler, the molecules condense, making the water more dense. Additionally, areas with higher salinity will also increase the density of the water because of the salt. Then, because these waters are denser, they sink in the ocean to the areas that are less dense. This results in layering of the ocean.
Compare and contrast upwelling and downwelling. Explain how each occurs in the global ocean.
Upwelling is the movement of cool dense water coming towards the surface at coastlines. It brings nutrients from the deep ocean to the surface, feeding life. Downwelling brings water to the bottom of the ocean, driving deep currents. This downwelling occurs because cool, saline water becomes dense, and then the dense water sinks. They are both currents that occur in the ocean to help with circulation, except one is going upwards, towards the surface, and the other is going down, away from the surface.
Define el niño and la niña. Explain how these climate patterns deviate from normal environmental conditions. (location) (warm/cool currents) (surface currents) (thermocline)
El Nino is when the ocean temperatures are above average by 0.5 degrees for 3 months, and La Nina is when the ocean temperautes are below average by 0.5 degrees for at least three months.
-La Nina trade winds start at the way West ocean and go to the East, but during neutral conditions the trade winds are more central and go both waysm and El Nino has westerlies and trade winds happening in the middle of the Pacific.
-During normal conditions, the warm water has a greater range with larger, central warm currents, but during the La Nina the warm water area is much smaller and way to the west and during El Nino conditions, the warm currents are in the East of the Pacific.
-During normal temperatures the deep, cold water comes earlier in the east pacific than in the west pacific, however under La Nina it is almost completely at the surface in the east and pretty low in the West and at El Nino, the start of the deep, cold water is at the same place all around.
-The surface currents are pretty similar going from east to west during La Nina (except a little faster) and under normal conditions and during El Nino, but During El Nino, the surface currents are a lot weaker from the East to the West.
-The Thermocline at neutral conditions is slanted, with it coming sooner in the East, but during La Nina, it is slanted a ton, with the Thermocline coming very soon when you go under the surface and the Thermocline is at the same location across the whole ocean during El Nino
