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Floating material on the water surface illustrating a front.

Floating material on the water surface illustrating a front.
Floating material on the water surface illustrating a front.
Floating material on the water surface illustrating a front.
Floating material on the water surface illustrating a front.
Geolocation data
(42°5′6″N, 69°59′28″W)
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197640
Fratantoni, David
Floating material on the water surface illustrating a front.
Still Image
05/25/2011
fratantoni-DSC0093.jpg
Caption from Oceanus magazine, Vol. 49, No. 1:
The atmosphere has boundaries between warm and cold air called fronts. The oceans has fronts, too, where currents with different temperatures and salinities collide. You can sometimes see the outline of fronts by the material that tends to accumulate along them.
Image of The Day caption:
Like the atmosphere, the ocean has fronts where masses of different temperature and salinity come together. Colder and/or saltier seawater is heavier than warmer, less salty water, and so it will slide beneath a lighter mass when the two collide. As the heavier water mass sinks, flotsam in it accumulates along the frontal boundary. Plankton also accumulates, drawing predatory animals to feed. WHOI scientists are studying feeding grounds along fronts that form in spring in the Great South Channel south of Cape Cod.
Photo by David Fratantoni
© Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
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