Research institutes from Bremen install new Arctic deep-sea o...(tion. The research schedule at the AWI H...)

Date:8/13/2009

tion. The research schedule at the AWI Hausgarten further contributes to other projects funded by the European Union: for example, work in shallower sea areas has been carried out in coordination with Norwegian Institutes in the framework of a project financed by the company StatoilHydro.

The construction of the long-term observatory LOOME (Long Term Observation of Mud Volcano Eruptions) was another focus of the expedition. The target of the observatory is to better understand the Hakon Mosby mud volcano situated at the Norwegian continental shelf in regard to the processes happening inside. The mud volcano has a diameter of about 1.5 km and it lies in 1.250 m water depth in the southwestern Barent Sea. Mud, gases and water are pressed from the centre of the active mud volcano from a depth of about three kilometres to the surface of the seafloor. The efflux decreases in the direction of the outer areas of this structure. This is the spot where methane gas hydrates can be found on the floor which help to stabilize this zone. Earlier research conducted by the Alfred Wegener Institute, the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology and the French Institute IFREMER show that the efflux controls the distribution of biological communities and the stability of the gas hydrates as well as their release. With the construction of the long-term observatory it is possible to examine the mud volcano in regard to sudden gas eruptions and possible effects on the gas hydrate system, the composition of the soil and the organisms living at the fringe of the mud volcano. "The distribution of the long-term observatory is an important milestone of the project ESONET", explains Dr. Dirk DeBeer, coordinator of the project from the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology in Bremen. "It was possible to install the complicated construction of the observatory as planned with the help of all partners from Germany, France and Norway involved in the project. It shows again that go
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Contact: Dr. Ude Cieluch ude.cieluch@awi.de 49-471-483-12008 Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres Source:Eurekalert

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