Collaborative Research: Role of the Central Scotia Sea Floor and North Scotia Ridge in the Onset and Development of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current

In addition they propose an installation of GPS receiver to test their paleogeographic reconstructions and determine whether South Georgia is moving as part of the South American plate. Broader impacts: A graduate student will be involved in all stages of the research. Undergraduate students will also be involved as watch-standers.

A community college teacher will participate in the cruise. The PIs will have a website on which there will be images of the actual ocean floor dredging in operation. The teacher will participate with web and outreach support through PolarTREC.

Results of the cruise are of broad interest to paleoceanographers, paleoclimate modelers and paleobiogeographers.A network of four continuous Global Navigational Satellite Systems (GNSS) receivers was installed on the bedrock of South Georgia in the Southern Ocean in 2013 and 2014. An additional receiver on a concrete foundation provides a tie to a tide gauge, part of the United Kingdom South Atlantic Tide Gauge Network.

The GNSS receivers have already provided data suggesting that the South Georgia microcontinent (SGM) is moving independent of both the South American plate to the north and the Scotia plate to the south. The data also demonstrate that the SGM is being uplifted.