Name: Daniela Lopez Topic: Chemistry and The Earth

Period:2

Ocean Circulation (Reading Notes)

Before Reading Questions:
What do you know about river currents or ocean currents? Have you ever experienced either?
They move the warmth across the world through currents. No.

What do you know about how water moves What do you know about why oceans are important
around the world? for life on Earth, and for people?
Ocean is important because not only is it water it
It moves through currents. I’ve seen diagrams. purifies the air like a tree sucking in CO2.
Read this article. Read the intro, then start reading from “What is ocean circulation?”
After Reading Questions:
What are ocean currents? What do they do?

Ocean currents, transport heat, marine organisms, nutrients, dissolved

gasses such as carbon dioxide and oxygen, and pollutants all over the
world.
What are some of the causes of ocean currents?

are primarily the result of wind pushing on the surface of the water, and the direction and
extent of their movement is determined by the distribution of continents.

What is a ‘vertical current’? What is a ‘surface current’?

What causes them?
Currents that move up and down in the
water column, also called vertical currents,
are created by differences in the density of
water masses, where heavier waters sink
and lighter waters rise.
What causes them?
Surface currents, also called horizontal
currents, are primarily the result of wind
pushing on the surface of the water, and the
direction and extent of their movement is
determined by the distribution of
continents.

How do vertical and horizontal currents combine to make the ‘global conveyor belt’?

It takes about 1000 years for water to circulate around what is called the global conveyor
belt that moves water three dimensionally throughout the world’s ocean basins.
According to the interactive models, when does heat enter or leave the water cycle/oceans?

How have human activities affected ocean circulation and the water cycle?