The Southern Ocean ranks amongst the most vulnerable of all oceanographic regions to acidification. While significant effort in the collection of data and observations has been made at a national level across the globe, a comprehensive and integrated circumpolar understanding of the changes occurring, and responses of organisms to these changes, is lacking. The Ocean Acidification Regional Hub for the Southern Ocean (SO-OA Hub) would provide a platform for the coordination of transdisciplinary research activities, tapping into the diverse expertise across the Southern Ocean OA research community. In this way we can support research on OA, its drivers, and biological responses, from local to regional scales. The hub will also be a conduit to communicate research outcomes and provide a mechanism to identify and prioritise emerging observational and research needs.
The SO-OA Hub is a joint SOOS Capability Working Group (CWG) and Global Ocean Acidification Observing Network (GOA-ON) Regional Hub.
The scientific focus of the hub will be on supporting observation-based research activities related to ocean acidification primarily on carbonate system change including acidity (pH) and OA’s impacts on marine ecosystems in the Southern Ocean, thereby directly addressing one of the key science challenges in the Southern Ocean (‘Assess the extent and impact of ocean acidification across the Southern Ocean‘).
The working group is open for involvement to anyone interested in the topic of Ocean Acidification within the Southern Ocean.
Join the hyrbid hub launch on 19 November 2024 at 14:40 AEST.