Saltwater intrusion in deltas and estuaries results from the complex interaction between water and salt dynamics, and is affected by climate change and human intervention. In the Pearl River Estuary (PRE) in China, these changes endanger freshwater availability affecting over 40 million people. PRE's complex shape (geometry and bathymetry) makes salt intrusion processes inherently three-dimensional. However, as previous research was mainly restricted to longitudinal variability, current knowledge is insufficient to unravel the interwoven longitudinal and lateral salt transport mechanisms. The overall aim of the SUPREME project is to understand these three-dimensional salt transport mechanisms, and their sensitivity to variations in external forcing and local geographic shape. The knowledge and tools developed/applied in this project will help assess the effectiveness of possible measures to alleviate undesired changes in salt intrusion. We adopt an integrated approach, involving both idealized and numerical modelling, as well as field measurements and data analysis. Idealized models include the essential physics and large-scale geometrical/bathymetrical features in a schematised way. Thus, they are specifically geared to clarify the interactions between governing physical mechanisms. Complex numerical models extend these results to transient forcing conditions and provide site-specific information. The combination of these two approaches provides insight, motivated and validated by new field measurements and existing data. This joint project between the Netherlands, China and the UK presents a new integrated framework to understand salt dynamics in the PRE and other estuaries. It further provides a more solid scientific basis for estuarine management to prevent damaging saltwater intrusion in these regions. In order to provide more generic and global outlook and applicability to our work, we will compare salt intrusion in the PRE to salt intrusion in two other estuaries: the Mersey (UK) and the Ems (Netherlands/Germany). The UK contribution of the project will be delivered by the National Oceanography Centre. The main focus of the UK research effort will be to develop and implement a state-of-the-art unstructured grid, numerical model of the PRE and other study areas. This numerical model will be used to conduct prognostic and diagnostic investigations. We will review a range of scenarios of future climate change and human interventions (e.g., sea level rise, river runoff, dredging, and freshwater abstraction). The UK contribution will also include long-term observations for the Mersey estuary, which will act as a pilot study for low-cost, long-term monitoring of salt intrusion in an estuary, thus providing proof-of-concept for a framework, which will be broadly applicable to other estuarine and deltaic systems in the world, including the PRE.

Marine plastic debris has been recorded across all parts of the globe and its potential to cause harm to marine wildlife and the healthy functioning of the oceans is an area of huge current concern. Microscopic plastic debris, (microplastic <5 mm in size and with no lower size limit), is a particular concern since its small size allows it to be consumed by many marine organisms, including those at the base of marine food webs and/or intended for human consumption. Coastal oceans are particularly vulnerable; they are in close proximity to human activities that contribute towards pollution and at the same time they are highly productive habitats that support a high abundance of marine life. Protecting these vulnerable habitats from any risk from microplastics is a high priority, but is hindered by a lack of fundamental knowledge; of what methods to use to measure them in marine samples and wildlife, of how microplastics move and behave in the marine environment, how they get into marine animals and what the consequences are for individual animals and for the healthy function of marine ecosystems. In this project we have brought together 4 Universities, the National Oceanography Centre and the Centre for the Environment, Fisheries and Agricultural Sciences (Cefas) to tackle these critical knowledge gaps, focusing on the UK Shelf seas. Our consortium includes scientists with a wealth of expertise in polymer science and the ecotoxicology of microplastics as pollutants, and who have pioneered the field. This unique expertise is strengthened by the addition of new, exciting approaches brought by excellent early career scientists with expertise in understanding the responses of marine ecosystems including at the microbial level and in using computational approaches to calculate environmental risk. We have designed a programme of work that includes many cutting edge new advances in technology, including a new method for measuring microplastics called FLAIR (Fluorescence assisted infrared microscopy) that offer the potential for rapid screening of many samples at once, allowing us to make experimental plans unhindered by technological limitations. We will develop the use of highly sensitive bio-imaging techniques to visualise microplastics deep within living tissues (Hyperspectral imaging, Coherent anti-Stokes Raman spectroscopy) and Quantittive Whole Body Autoradiography (QWBA) for tracing how microplastics move between prey animals and their predators. We will determine how the presence of microplastics and examples of the ubiquitous priority pollutants that can sorb to them in seawater affect the biology of marine invertebrates and fish. We will also determine how microplastics and contaminants affect the functioning of marine shelf seas sediments and the organisms that live in them under different ocean chemistry conditions. This is important because these processes support many aspects of marine life. Finally, we will bring all of this data together with the very extensive body of existing monitoring data available to the project through ongoing activities of all partners, to construct a geospatial risk map for the UK shelf seas, using the latest approaches in integrated risk assessment. This unique risk map will offer a predictive tool for working out where impacts from microplastics pollution are likely to occur and risks are greatest, enabling policy makers to make science-backed assertions, e.g. to protect vulnerable habitats, aquaculture, fish spawning areas, fishing activities and other relevant ecosystem services. It will also provide a means of tracking remedial actions and to investigate whether there are 'proxies' for the presence of microplastic pollution that are quicker and easier to measure than microplastics themselves.

When tectonic plates separate, the peridotite rock in the Earth's upper mantle rises and melts, then the melt cools to form oceanic crust. Generally this crust is 6-7 km thick, but in some areas it is much thinner and may be missing altogether. Such a situation occurs around the Fifteen Twenty Fracture Zone on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Here, peridotite crops out extensively for tens of kilometres along the ridge axis, in zones marked by complex topography and faulting. This provides a superb opportunity to study both rocks from the mantle, and the processes by which seafloor spreading takes place in the absence of substantial melt or a thick crust. The ocean drilling programme has already drilled eight deep holes in the area, and we will complement that work with very detailed mapping and taking many more shallow samples. We will image the seafloor using sonar, and use this to map the faults and different rock types. We will then choose sites where we will take up to 60 shallow cores of rock. These samples will be oriented in space, allowing us to determine properties such as the directions of flow, stretching and fracturing as the mantle rocks were emplaced, and subsequent rotations by faulting. Chemical analysis will enable us to unravel details of where these rocks originated and how they melted and subsequently evolved.

ECOMAR is a £2 million project aimed at understanding how physical and biogeochemical factors influence the distributions and structure of deep-sea communities, focusing on the fauna of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge at 4 sites in different environmental settings. The four sites are located on either side of the MAR and to the north and south of the Charlie Gibbs Fracture Zone (CGFZ), which coincides with the Sub-Polar Front. Using these localities we will investigate the effects of topography and currents on the distribution of the fauna, and the effects of varying organic input in two different biogeochemical settings. The work will focus on rocky slope fauna and sediment pockets in mixed bottoms rather than hydrothermal vents, which are relatively well known. In addition the MAR fauna will be compared with similar rocky slope fauna on the European and American continental margins to determine broad principals on the influence of physical and biogeochemical factors on the composition of the benthic fauna. The MAR is frontier territory and will lead to many new exciting discoveries. We will study the physical, chemical and biological environment of the MAR in terms of circulation, production, biomass and biodiversity. The MAR is a topographically difficult place to sample, which has no doubt contributed to the current lack of knowledge of this region. Therefore ECOMAR will employ the latest technologies to overcome this problem including precision acoustic sensors, instrumented moorings, autonomous lander vehicles, suspended camera systems and the new 6,500m rated research ROV Isis. The first of three proposed cruises to the region will produce detailed bathymetric maps of the study sites to aid deployment of instrument moorings and sampling equipment. In addition intensive CTD sampling will be employed to characterise the circulation in the vicinity of the Sub-Polar Front and provide calibration data for ongoing remote sensing research. The subsequent cruises will continue sampling programmes for pelagic biology using modern acoustic techniques as well as nets. In addition targeted benthic sampling and experimentation will take place using towed cameras and lander vehicles. Finally the ROV Isis will provide the only means of documenting and sampling the fauna of the MAR in addition to taking precision samples for geochemical analysis. The presence of the Sub-Polar Front and influence of the North Atlantic Current (NAC) provide for contrasting production regimes with cold, fresh and well stratified waters creating a biologically productive region to the north of the CGFZ. In contrast the waters to the south are warm, saline and less productive. The strength and position of the NAC will be monitored during the ECOMAR project to allow accurate estimates of export production to the benthos of the MAR. The use of remote sensing technologies, coupled with shipboard biological and physical measurements, will allow patterns of primary production over the MAR to be studied at higher spatial and temporal resolutions. By integrating satellite estimations of primary production with shipboard measurements estimates of export flux can be made and then compared with data from an array of four sediment trap moorings. The supply of food to the deep-sea floor plays a major role in structuring benthic communities and driving rate processes such as reproduction, metabolism and activity. By measuring the composition and quantity of this material both as phytoplankton, zooplankton and sedimenting aggregates the ECOMAR project will be able to identify the driving forces behind observed patterns of abundance, biomass and diversity in the fauna of the MAR.

A recent NERC-funded proof of concept award successfully demonstrated that Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) signals reflected off the sea surface and received by very low cost (<£30) GPS receivers can be used to estimate the difference in height between the receiver and the water. This represents a method of remotely sensing tidal elevations and, if averaged over time, mean sea level. These could be routinely and remotely measuring sea level at a cost that would allow unprecedented numbers of systems to be deployed around the world by organisations of all sizes and levels of funding. Here we propose to take the initial proof of concept from TRL 3 up to TRL 7 by designing a self-contained unit that receives, records and processes the required signals to output a tidal water level in near real time and at a target hardware and assembly cost of less than £100. The demonstration units will be tested and used by our project partners, the RNLI, initially to provide tidal information at an intertidal causeway with a history of RNLI rescues of members of the public who have become stranded by the rising tide. The technology has the potential to be rolled out not only across the UK but globally, potentially as open source designs & firmware, revolutionising the ability to collect tidal and sea level data at an unprecedented price point and operational simplicity.