Abstract
The international array of profiling floats known as Argo is a major component of the global ocean-and climate-observing system. In 2010, the NAOS (Novel Argo Observing System) project was selected as part of France's Equipex Investissement d'Avenir program. The objectives of NAOS were to consolidate the French contribution to the Argo core mission (global temperature and salinity measurements down to 2,000 m) as well as to develop the future generation of French Argo profiling floats and prepare the next phase of the Argo program with an extension to the deep ocean (Deep-Argo), biogeochemistry (BGC-Argo) and polar seas. This paper summarizes the main technological advances and at-sea validations carried out as part of NAOS: development of a deep (4,000 m) float, a new BGC float for Research & Development (R&D) applications, and a BGC float for deployments in Arctic areas, assessment of a new density and Absolute Salinity optical sensor, improvement of the reliability of the standard Argo float, and upgraded satellite-transmission performance. French profiling floats developed in this way are now operational and among the most deployed worldwide, and the density sensor is the most promising of its kind for profiling floats applications.
Highlights
Argo is an international array of about 4,000 profiling floats that measure temperature and salinity throughout the global oceans, down to 2,000 m (Riser et al, 2016; Roemmich et al, 2019)
The objectives of NAOS were to consolidate the French contribution to the Argo core mission as well as to develop the future generation of French Argo profiling floats and prepare the phase of the Argo program, namely a global full-depth multidisciplinary array that includes an extension to the deep ocean (Deep-Argo), biogeochemistry (BGC-Argo), and polar seas (Roemmich et al, 2019; Claustre et al, 2020)
The Workshop highlighted the need for a network of 1,200 deep profiling floats (Zilberman et al, 2019) to perform Argo-like cycles every 10 days for 4 years, sampling the ocean over the entire water column
Summary
Argo is an international array of about 4,000 profiling floats that measure temperature and salinity throughout the global oceans, down to 2,000 m (Riser et al, 2016; Roemmich et al, 2019). This paper is divided into six separated sections which detail technological developments and applications on the various components of the Argo program, respectively: (i) the DeepArvor; (ii) the new biogeochemical Provor CTS5; (iii) underice applications; (iv) the NOSS Absolute Salinity and density sensor; (v) improvements in the performance of the Arvor float; and (vi) an evaluation of satellite-communications systems on profiling floats. The second development is the 3-headed Deep-Arvor, equipped with the reinforced SBE41CP sensor and embedded with two additional CTDs: the RBRconcerto and the SBE61CP (Figure 3, right) This profiling float was designed as an intercomparison platform to evaluate the three CTDs at sea.
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