The objectives of the BELMER project are: - to validate the MERIS water products for Belgian coastal waters and neighbouring French, UK and Dutch waters - to provide a quantitative statement of product accuracy and recommendations for improvements in the scientific algorithms, where appropriate. In particular the problems reported by the MERIS validation and user communities of turbid water atmospheric correction, case 2 water chlorophyll retrieval, adjacency effects (straylight), moderate sunglint, spatio-temporal variability of specific inherent optical properties and bottom reflectance will be addressed. This project is funded by the "PROgramme for the Development of scientific Experiments" (PRODEX) of the European Space Agency (ESA).

Acoustic measurements.

This cruise is part of the UK science contribution to the international SOLAS project (Surface Ocean Lower Atmosphere Study www.uea.ac.uk/env/solas/) which aims to advance our understanding of environmentally important interactions between the ocean and the atmosphere. Data collected during the cruise will help to determine the influence of coastal/shelf regions (20-200 km offshore) on microbiological activity in the ocean and chemical interactions between the ocean and the atmosphere. Deep water containing high concentrations of nutrients such as nitrate, and gases such as nitrous oxide and methane, rises to the surface (upwells) at the Mauritanian shelf edge and moves offshore. These nutrients can be chemically altered by sunlight and used by bacteria and microscopic plants to grow. The gases escape to the atmosphere and contribute to global warming. This cruise will sample the upwelled water as it moves offshore measuring its temperature, salinity, nutrient and gas content and the impact this water has on microbiological growth and atmospheric composition in order to improve international global climate models. The cruise has three scientific objectives: 1. To determine the role of upwelling on the supply, loss and air-sea exchange of climatically important gases produced by plankton 2. To determine the role of light in breaking down upwelled and recently produced dissolved organic matter and in producing climatically important trace gases 3. To determine the impact of nutrient enriched upwelled water on the spatial and temporal variability of plankton community structure and activity and resultant influence on biogenic gas flux

<p>The MEDITGIB 2014 campaign is a physical oceanography campaign; it aims to study the Mediterranean outflow and its future in the Gulf of Cadiz. The aim is to qualify the Mediterranean waters at the entrance to the Strait upstream and monitor their transformation through the Strait to identify mixing zones along the way. The monitoring extends downstream into the Gulf of Cadiz where the Mediterranean outflow enters at the exit of the Strait: its extension and distribution in the Gulf are part of the problem of the campaign.&nbsp; In the direction entering the Mediterranean Sea, the aim is to follow the Atlantic surface waters and their future towards the Mediterranean Sea;</p> <p>One of the rapid dynamic oceanographic processes that potentially has a role in the Strait area as well as to the east is the internal waves; MeditGib is particularly interested in the generation zones identified in the Camarinal threshold area and the eastward propagation of the generated waves. To this end, several instrumental devices are moored (current meter, thermistor chain) throughout the campaign.</p>

<p>The WESTMEDFLUX-2 oceanographic cruise is part of the project that studies the presence of thermal anomalies in the ocean-continent transitions of the Western Mediterranean. The proposed cruise follows WESTMEDFLUX that took place in 2016 and that resulted in mapping regional trends of thermicity in in the Gulf of Lion, offshore Baleares and Sardinia. It also pointed out to the existence of several local heat flow anomalies in particular on the South Balearic slope and deep basin. In the deep oceanic basin, strong anomalies seem to be merely associated to salt diapiric structures, but on the rifted continent and transition zone, other heat sink and sources are suggested (e.g., bottom water currents, slope instabilities and focused fluid migrations). In order to better understand the source of these anomalies and the link with the crustal nature and structuring of the margin, we propose on the South-Balearic margin additional close-spaced heat flow measurement, sediment coring and dredging sites. Sediment cores will be used for turbidite and contourite studies and for geochemical analysis of pore fluids. The dredging operations aim an estimation of age and nature of volcanic rock material from sea mounts.</p>

The series of PELMED cruises began in 1993. Their objective is to assess small pelagic resources in the Gulf of Lion, using the echo-integration method and trawling to identify the detections observed. Until 2007, each cruise consisted in systematically prospecting from Port-Vendres to Marseille, along 9 legs set 12 nautical miles apart, perpendicular to the coast, in daytime (6 am to 9 pm), along the entire width of the continental shelf. Acquisition along legs for acoustic prospection covered 440 nautical miles and the catches from trawling to identify the structures encountered led to a complete analysis: number and weight by species, size sampling, otolith samples taken in order to construct size-age keys for sardines, anchovies and hake, updating of biological parameters.