CUSTARD

CUSTARD uses year-round observations and modelling to investigate how marine life in the Southern Ocean is responsible for the uptake and storage of atmospheric carbon dioxide.

The surface ocean is home to billions of microscopic plants called phytoplankton which use sunlight and carbon dioxide to reproduce. When they die many of them sink, taking carbon that was originally in the atmosphere into the deep ocean, where it may be stored for hundreds to thousands of years. This helps keep our climate the way it is today.