CARINA: Ocean Biogeochemical Profiles from the South Atlantic

CARINA/29HE19951203 cruise data contains biological, chemical, and physical profile measurements from the South Atlantic Ocean. The dataset includes discrete sample and CTD data for alkalinity, dissolved oxygen, nutrients, chlorophyll, and other variables relevant to carbon system studies. It is part of the international CARINA synthesis project for creating internally consistent ocean biogeochemical datasets.

Use Cases

• Investigating ocean carbon system dynamics based on alkalinity and dissolved inorganic carbon measurements.
• Analyzing nutrient (nitrate, phosphate, silicate) distributions and their relation to biological productivity.
• Studying water mass properties and structure using CTD-derived temperature, salinity, and hydrostatic pressure profiles.
• Calibrating and validating ocean biogeochemical models with discrete sample data for multiple parameters.

Strengths

• Contains a multi-parameter suite of 16+ measured variables including key carbon system and nutrient parameters.
• Data is part of the CARINA synthesis project, which aims for internal consistency across cruises.
• Provides both high-resolution CTD profiles and discrete bottle sample data from the same cruise.

Limitations

• Key metadata is missing or conflicting: row count, column names, and specific license are unknown across all sources.
• Author affiliations are inconsistently reported between data.gov and NASA Earthdata sources.
• The dataset's specific size and complete data structure are not documented.

Provenance

Source

Data collected during cruise CARINA/29HE19951203 on the R/V HESPERIDES by researchers from CSIC, IIM, and Universidad de Oviedo.

Collection Method

Discrete water samples and continuous profiles collected using CTD and bottle instruments.

Time Range

1995-12-03 to 1996-01-05

Freshness

Metadata was last updated on 2026-03-05 according to data.gov, but the underlying data collection ended in 1996-01-05.

Geography

South Atlantic Ocean