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Geolens

Realm

Water & Carbon

Follow water and carbon

Trace water and carbon through connected stores, then compare the behaviour of rivers, oceans and catchments.

The muddy Ucayali River winds through forest in Peru, with abandoned bends beside the active channel.
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Ucayali River, Peru, photographed from the ISS. Meander migration leaves cut-offs and abandoned channels across the floodplain.
Wisps of low fog rise above a calm lake on a frosty morning, with trees reflected in the water.
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Water & Carbon

Water cycle stores and flows

Water moves between the atmosphere, land and ocean through evaporation, precipitation and flows at and below the surface.

ASTER satellite image of branching tributary valleys near the Colorado River in Canyonlands, Utah.
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Water & Carbon

Drainage basin

A drainage basin collects water that flows towards a common outlet.

A streamflow-gauging station beside Huey Creek in Antarctica's rocky McMurdo Dry Valleys.
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Water & Carbon

Storm hydrograph

A storm hydrograph shows how river discharge changes after rainfall.

Floodwater from the Stillaguamish River surrounds a picnic table and trees.
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Water & Carbon

River regime

A river regime describes the seasonal pattern of discharge.

False-colour MODIS brightness-temperature image showing the Gulf Stream and warm eddies in the North Atlantic.
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Water & Carbon

Ocean currents

Surface winds and Earth’s rotation help organise subtropical ocean gyres.

Circular plates of new pancake ice cover the surface of the western Ross Sea in Antarctica.
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Water & Carbon

Thermohaline conveyor

Seawater density depends on temperature and salinity.

Dense green tropical forest canopy at Bodiman, Cameroon.
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Water & Carbon

Carbon cycle

Carbon moves among the atmosphere, organisms, soils, ocean and rocks.

NOAA sea-surface temperature anomaly map with warmer-than-average water across the equatorial Pacific in late 2015.
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Water & Carbon

ENSO and the Walker cell

Across the tropical Pacific, trade winds, warm surface water and the thermocline interact.

A karst spring in Alabama flows over rocks from a wooded limestone slope.
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Water & Carbon

Groundwater

Groundwater fills connected pores and fractures below the water table.