When Charlie Flagg and I started the Oleander project our focus was on Gulf Stream (GS) volume and heat transport and how these might vary or trend over time. At the time that was enough of a challenge – we gave little thought to other uses of the data – just collecting it was an effort since the data were recorded on disks that had to be fetched every other week when the Oleander was in Port Elizabeth. Sandy Fontana would process the data and post the results on a server Charlie maintained. As the data base grew we began to explore the shape of the stream, seasonal variations in transport, rings and the Slope Current. Over time the velocity and XBT data became a growing resource for a number of studies. But until Magdalena Andres took the conn and really strengthened the Oleander project I had no idea how widely the Oleander data had been used. Ever since the project started the data have been publicly available. And still are. The graphic below, prepared by Magdalena, will give you an idea of the range of topics the Oleander ADCP data have contributed to.
If the graph doesn’t display click on this link: https://bios.asu.edu/oleander/scientific-impact
In addition, the NOAA monthly XBT sections, which started in 1977, have become a tremendous archive of temperature across the shelf and Slope waters in the early years - later expanding to the entire distance from New Jersey to Bermuda. In fact, it was when we learned from the NOAA/NMFS/XBT group that a new Oleander was being built that Charlie and I explored the possibility of installing an ADCP in the vessel. The Bermuda Container Line was very receptive to the idea.
The publications list from all Oleander data comprises currently 66 papers and thousands of citations: https://bios.asu.edu/oleander/publications
And yet there are numerous topics that haven’t explored or can be revisited thanks to the new and far more comprehensive data base. This includes zooming in on the frontal potential vorticity structure of the GS by combining velocity with the monthly high-resolution XBT sections.
Another topic of interest might be reverse geostrophy, that is to infer density from velocity and check the result against the high resolution XBT sections. The objective would be to determine how well one can predict density from velocity. How much filtering is required to suppress the ageostrophic sub-mesoscale to get best agreement with observed temperature. How useful will it be to have isolated the ageostrophic part of the observed velocity field?
A topic that remains largely untouched is acoustic backscatter. We see of course the diurnal migration of zooplankton and myctophids, but there so much more to learn about seasonal variations as well their distribution across the different water masses from north to south as well as within various dynamical features.
The Oleander dashboard gives daily near real-time information of currents, surface water properties and weather: https://sciencerocs-dev.whoi.edu/ol_index.html We now have high resolution weather and sea surface conditions. Anyone who has worked in the GS knows how rapidly conditions can change when crossing the thermal front. These twice-weekly crossings will enable detailed studies air-sea interactions at strong fronts, how winds affect the surface velocity field and vice versa. There is so much to be explored and understood!