Research, Academia & Teaching

My PhD Research

Project title: Changing Atlantic influences on northwest European shelf seas

My PhD research focussed on the changing North Atlantic Ocean and its effects within European shelf seas. Using model outputs and observational datasets, I analysed how the shelf seas are driven by basin-scale change over different timescales. There was a strong emphasis on quantifying changes in temperature and salinity structure in the North Sea. I was excited to be taking an interdisciplinary approach to this: I am interested in how both physical and chemical changes to the water structure alter shelf sea ecosystems and productivity.

My PhD research follows on from my MSci final year research project, which quantified a cold temperature anomaly in the North Atlantic Subpolar Gyre and its effects on transport towards and along the European shelf edge.

I am supervised by Prof. Robert (Bob) Marsh (University of Southampton) and Dr. James Harle (National Oceanography Centre).

Publications & Research Output

Journal articles

• Clark, M., Marsh, R., and Harle, J. (2022): Weakening and warming of the European Slope Current since the late 1990s attributed to basin-scale density changes, Ocean Sci., https://doi.org/10.5194/os-18-549-2022 Published 02/05/2022, view HERE

Code and data analysis

• Clark, M., Marsh, R. and Harle, J. (2022). Code for "Weakening and warming of the European Slope Current since the late 1990s attributed to basin-scale density changes". Zenodo, https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.6415360 Published 05/04/2022, view HERE

Other publications

• PhD thesis titled "Changing Atlantic Influences on Northwest European shelf seas". University of Southampton eprints repository. Published July 2023, view HERE
• Challenger Wave newsletter June 2020, SALTS article "The Last Ship": a short article about my three weeks at sea with the RAPID cruise in March 2020. Published June 2020, view HERE

Public Scientific Outreach

• I have started a blog! New and exciting content will be published from time to time. Keep an eye on my Twitter account for notifications of new posts.
• I was involved in a project to 3D scan the RRS James Cook for use in a virtual tour. The scans were published on the NOC website and will be used in future open days and other outreach activities.
• I wrote Challenger Wave newsletter June 2020 SALTS article ("The Last Ship") about my time at sea on the RAPID-AMOC cruise in March 2020. This was written in collaboration with Fraser Goldsworth, University of Oxford DTP student.
• I have worked for University and NOC Open Days, giving tours of the facilities on offer and discussing the available courses and research options available to them.

Teaching & Demonstrating

During my time as a PhD student, I was also a postgraduate demonstrator for several undergraduate modules in the School of Ocean and Earth Science at the University:

• SOES1004: Physics Of The Ocean (formerly Physical Oceanography 1). I demonstrated some boatwork techniques on board RV Callisa. As this is a first year module, this is often students' first time on a research vessel.
• SOES1013: Key Skills for Marine Scientists. I have led a Meteorology fieldcourse component, which focusses on marine meteorological observations and forecasts.
• SOES2010: The Dynamic Ocean (formerly Physical Oceanography 2). Assisting with boatwork & Matlab tutorials.
• SOES3010: Large Scale Ocean Processes & Climate. Matlab tutorials.
• SOES6014: Introduction to Physical Oceanography. I assisted with a basic calculation tutorial for new MSc students.
• SOES6018: MSc Key Skills and Literature Review. I showed the Masters students how to use the CTD and ADCP systems on board RV Callista.

Sea-going research experience: RAPID cruise, March 2020

My PhD research did not include any fieldwork, and what fieldwork I have done previously as part of my MSci was on board the University vessel RV Callista for only a few hours at a time. So in March 2020, I volunteered as a core science team member on the RAPID Cruise to get valuable insight and practical experience of observational oceanography at sea. My scientific roles included:

• Taking 2-hourly meteorolgical observations.
• Taking 4-hourly seawater samples for salinometer analysis.
• Assisting with the deployment and recovery of oceanographic moorings (see video below).
• Daily processing of bathymetry, navigation and underway sampling data, using some Matlab scripts and programs.

For a detaled summary of life at sea on the RAPID cruise was like, please read my Challenger Wave article "The Last Ship" and blog post "Moorings: The workhorse of the RAPID project" which summarises the key components of the moorings we were servicing. Thanks to the National Oceanography Centre for funding my placement.

Time lapse of the deployment of mooring EB1 (Eastern Boundary 1), a 5000m long mooring fitted with MicroCAT CTD devices. Please note: video has no sound.