The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution will continue an oceanographic instrumentation development project to develop, construct, and test a multi-channel, in situ flow injection chemical analysis system. The objective of the device is to make autonomous in-situ colorometric measurements of nitrate and phosphate to full ocean depths for periods of up to six months. Simultaneous measurement of additional inorganic nutrients is planned for he future. A shallow water prototype has been constructed, but is depth limited because it relies on an umbilical cable to provide power and to control the various pumps and motors. This new effort will develop the electronics and mechanisms to enable the analyzer to function autonomously in depths of down to 6,000 meters. Anti-fouling measures will be developed and reagent stability tests will be made to allow long-term unattended deployments. The analyzer is ideally suited for testing a new scientific hypothesis about primary productivity in oligotrophic waters being driven by sporadic and short-lived injections of nutrients. The analyzer is also intended to have numerous applications in time-series investigations relating to GOFS Global Geoscience initiative.
