Australia’s Integrated Marine Observing System (IMOS) is enabled by the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS). It is operated by a consortium of institutions as an unincorporated joint venture, with the University of

Tasmania as Lead Agent.

IMOS Bulletin Issue #92 August 2020 Welcome to the IMOS Bulletin. Please feel free to distribute this email bulletin to others. The Bulletin is also available for download from the website at http://imos.org.au/news/news-publications/bulletin/. If you have any comments or questions regarding the IMOS Bulletin please contact IMOS Communications, communication@imos.org.au.

Update from the IMOS Director regarding changed working conditions due to COVID-19 Hello IMOS community. I hope you are all safe and well in your various locations around the country. As many of you know we have just completed quarterly reporting for April to June and we are starting to see the effects of the initial shut down on milestone and data delivery. We thank all of you for keeping us informed of your progress and activities. The NCRIS team requested a COVID update from us earlier this month and we were able to fully advise them of our situation thanks to all of you keeping us informed. Although we have missed some milestones, there is progress in resuming and keeping operations going. A number of the incomplete milestones for the April to June quarter are delayed rather than cancelled indicating the work can be made up and data losses minimised. Ships are also resuming operations which is a big step forward. For example, both of the AIMS vessels are operating to conduct priority field operations and the RV Investigator is set to depart this week to service the Southern Ocean deep water mooring. It is great to see positive steps in a period of such unpredictability. We are actively looking to capture positive points to share with our community. I think we could all use a few bright spots right about now, so if you have positive news please share it with us in the office so we can spread some good news. As the pandemic continues, I hope that you are looking after yourselves, your families and your colleagues mentally and physically. Take care everyone. Michelle Heupel Michelle.Heupel@utas.edu.au

Australia’s Integrated Marine Observing System (IMOS) is enabled by the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS). It is operated by a consortium of institutions as an unincorporated joint venture, with the University of

Tasmania as Lead Agent.

The latest news from the Australian Ocean Data Network (AODN) New user-friendly time series products from the IMOS coastal mooring network The AODN and National Mooring Network Facilities have completed a project creating long time series products ensuring the wealth of IMOS mooring data is more accessible to users. More information. AODN team are upgrading the GeoNetwork metadata catologues underpinning the AODN Portal. More information. New developments to the AODN Portal enhance data discovery. The AODN team have improved the way you can select and view data collections on the AODN Portal. More information. Waverider Buoys deployed by the New Zealand Defence Force are providing critical information about conditions in the remote Southern Ocean. The wave climate data from the Southern Ocean site is now available via the AODN Portal. More information. AODN releases a new version of the IMOS MATLAB Toolbox. Data quality to be improved with the inclusion of a new Quality Control test – IMOS MATLAB Toolbox release, version 2.6.9. More information. IMOS multi-satellite sea surface temperature (SST) composite products have been updated The IMOS Multi-sensor L3S composites of SST have recently been reprocessed by the Bureau of Meteorology and are now available from the AODN Portal back to 2012 (previously only back to 1 Jan 2018). They also contain data streams from additional satellites that significantly improves the spatial coverage and accuracy of the products. More information. The IMOS data holdings are detailed in a suite of reports generated by the AODN on a monthly basis. The summary reports for July 2020 can be downloaded directly via the IMOS website. Ocean Glider Facility releases a new version of NetCDF Ninja

This data tool is designed to make working with complex NetCDF files quick and easy, with new features including enhanced plotting options, pan and zoom, and global editing functionality. More information. IMOS Activity Planning

You can now view an interactive map of the IMOS Facilities and their planned activities on the IMOS website at http://imos.org.au/facilities/imosactivityplanning/. Please note that since March 2020 due to the travel bans and social distancing measures necessary to manage COVID-19 many of the observing activities of IMOS have been delayed.

• Deep Water Moorings – The rescheduled Marine National Facility voyage to turnaround the Southern Ocean Time Series deep water mooring departed Hobart on the 27th August.

• Ocean Gliders – A slocum glider will be deployed at Yamba, NSW. • Larval Fish – Sampling will occur at five National Reference Station moorings.

Australia’s Integrated Marine Observing System (IMOS) is enabled by the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS). It is operated by a consortium of institutions as an unincorporated joint venture, with the University of

Tasmania as Lead Agent.

Have you used IMOS data? We want to hear about it.

If you have used or are using IMOS data, it's simple to let us know through our new self-reporting links on our website. http://imos.org.au/news/user-reporting/.

Call for projects and science using IMOS data to profile through our social media accounts Do you use IMOS data in your science? We want to hear about it! We want to celebrate and share your amazing and innovative work on our social media accounts. Please get in touch with the IMOS Communications team via communication@imos.org.au. In particular we like to highlight students and early career researchers who use IMOS data, so if you are a student or early career researcher using IMOS data and would like to be featured please fill in this online form.

Papers of the month

This month we’d like to highlight the following papers that used IMOS data: Wynn-Edwards, CA et al. 2020. Particle Fluxes at the Australian Southern Ocean Time Series (SOTS) Achieve Organic Carbon Sequestration at Rates Close to the Global Median, Are Dominated by Biogenic Carbonates, and Show No Temporal Trends Over 20-Years. Frontiers in Earth Science 8:329. doi: 10.3389/feart.2020.00329 The IMOS Southern Ocean Time Series (SOTS) site serves as an important baseline of carbon flux rates, with 20 years of data to date. SOTS is now one of the longest time-series in the Southern Ocean and will be a key sentinel for change in this globally significant region for carbon export. Read the full paper.

Location of the SOTS site. Figure: Frontiers in Earth Science.

Australia’s Integrated Marine Observing System (IMOS) is enabled by the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS). It is operated by a consortium of institutions as an unincorporated joint venture, with the University of

Tasmania as Lead Agent.

McCosker E, Davies CH, Beckley LE. 2020 Oceanographic influence on coastal zooplankton assemblages at three IMOS National Reference Stations in Western Australia. Marine and Freshwater Research, https://doi.org/10.1071/MF19397 Zooplankton are great indicators of ocean change because their distribution and abundance respond quickly to ocean conditions and climate-mediated processes. The long-term monitoring at the IMOS National Reference Stations are critical to understanding the mechanisms that structure zooplankton assemblages. This study used IMOS data to examine the main oceanographic drivers of spatial and temporal variation in zooplankton assemblages at our three National Reference Stations located in coastal Western Australian waters; Ningaloo (22°S), Rottnest (32°S) and Esperance (34°S). Read the full paper. Hemming MP, Roughan M and Schaeffer A. 2020 Daily Subsurface Ocean Temperature Climatology Using Multiple Data Sources: New Methodology. Frontiers in Marine Science 7:485. doi: 10.3389/fmars.2020.00485 This study has published a new methodology to combine diverse multi-decade datasets to produce a daily subsurface temperature climatology. The study used 66 years of data from the IMOS Port Hacking National Reference Station mooring (prior to 2010 this site was maintained through the CSIRO Coastal Monitoring Program and the New South Wales Office of Environment and Heritage). The resulting daily climatology is useful for determining periods of anomalously high (Marine heatwaves) or low ocean temperatures. Read the full paper.

Recent and Upcoming Events

AIMS Webinar “How and why we monitor water quality on the GBR” available via YouTube

Australian Institute of Marine (AIMS) Science Biological-chemical oceanographer Dr Renee Gruber presented a webinar for National Science Week 2020 about AIMS’ water quality monitoring science in the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, including the Marine Monitoring Program – Inshore Water Quality and IMOS observations. Watch the video to discover why we collect water quality information and learn about the tools and methods scientists use to collect these data out in the ocean. AusSeabed Webinar Series: Bringing the seabed to you

With the postponement of the AMSA 2020 Conference, AusSeabed is holding a series of online webinars the next one is:

• Cross sector talks on the applications of seabed mapping September 24th, register here.

AMSA 2021 Conference 27 June – 2 July 2021

Early bird registration is now available for the AMSA 2021 Conference, register at the 2020 Early Bird rates until 30 September 2020.

Inaugural Advancing Earth Observation Forum (AEO 2021) 23-27 August 2021 More information.

Australia’s Integrated Marine Observing System (IMOS) is enabled by the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS). It is operated by a consortium of institutions as an unincorporated joint venture, with the University of

Tasmania as Lead Agent.

IMOS acknowledges the Traditional Custodians and Elders of the land and sea on which we work and observe and recognise their unique connection to land and sea. We pay our respects to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples past, present and future.