Hi Reddit, this is Rob McKay and Laura De Santis, co-chief scientists on the International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP) Expedition 374 to Antarctica. We’re pulling up sediments from below the sea floor to look back in time about 20 million years to see how the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) evolved up to the present day. With this information, alongside our model-making colleagues, we can predict the future of Antarctica. This is particularly important because Antarctica is the largest source of fresh water on the planet and could contribute about 200 feet of sea level rise! It’s important to know how much the WAIS could contribute and when. To do this, a scientific team of sendimentologists, micropaleontologists, paleomagnetists, physical properties specialists, and geochemists have teamed up on the scientifici drilling ship the JOIDES Resolution for 9 weeks to drill thousands of feet below the sea floor and millions of years back in time. Read more about the expedition here: https://iodp.tamu.edu/scienceops/expeditions/ross_sea_ice_sheet_history.html. Looking forward to answering your questions! ​

The International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP) conducts scientific ocean drilling expeditions throughout the world’s oceans in search of clues to Earth’s structure and past. Right now we are currently in the middle of Expedition 369, sailing along parts of the southern and western coast of Australia. We are interested in finding out more about what the Earth was like during the Cretaceous Period when the Earth was experiencing an extreme greenhouse climate. During this time period, Antarctica had no ice cover and was actually attached to Australia. About 94 million years ago, they broke apart. Part of the expedition is also studying this plate tectonic movement. The scientists we have onboard who will be answering your questions include: Dr Brian Huber is one of the co-chief scientists for Expedition 369. He works at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington D.C. His research focuses on changes in global climate between 115 to 35 million years ago and the microscopic organisms called foraminifera during that time interval. Dr Richard Hobbs is the other co-chief scientist for Expedition 369. He is a professor in the Department of Earth Science at Durham University in the UK. His research focuses on understanding more about seismic waves and he’s currently involved with several different projects that will help scientists better study and understand the seismic data they collect. Dr Vivien Cumming is a freelance writer and photographer focused on bringing science to the public. She has a background in Earth sciences with a PhD from Durham University and postdoctoral research experience from Harvard and McGill Universities. Lauren O’Connor is sailing as an organic geochemist, and her role is analysing gas from core samples and determining the amount of carbonate and organic carbon in the rocks we’re drilling. She just finished her PhD at the University of Oxford. She is a palaeoclimatologist working on the Late Cretaceous (66-100 million years ago), reconstructing changes in ocean temperature, and how those temperature changes compare to changes in atmospheric CO2, ocean circulation, and the orbit of the Earth. Dr Lloyd White is a Lecturer in the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Wollongong, Australia and an Honorary Research Fellow in the Department of Earth Sciences, Royal Holloway, University of London. Lloyd’s research focuses on understanding how plates break apart and how mountains form in plate collision zones. The JOIDES Resolution is the only research vessel operated by the United States dedicated to scientific ocean drilling. As Us Anything!

The International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP) conducts scientific ocean drilling expeditions throughout the world’s oceans in search of clues to Earth’s structure and past. The current expedition is Expedition 366: Marina Convergent Margin, aboard the U.S. vessel for scientific ocean drilling, the JOIDES Resolution. The scientists embarking on this expedition hope to learn (1) how sediments, fluids and chemicals move and cycle through the earth’s crust; (2) the role of tectonics and mud volcanoes in transporting fluids and sediments in subduction zones; and (3) how these physical and chemical movements impact living organisms. The research team will use deep sea drilling technology to drill into undersea mud volcanoes near the Mariana Trench, taking core samples of sediments and fluids that they can study on board the ship. By analyzing the chemicals, sediment layers, and microorganisms within the core sample, scientists can answer questions about how rocks, fluids, and chemicals cycle through the earth’s crust, and this affects life on the seafloor and beyond. Studying sediment layers, geochemical cycles, and fluid dynamics in the earth’s crust can tell us a lot about how geological formations (like volcanoes, canyons, and mountains) are formed, and how they change over long periods of time. By extracting cores in subduction zones, scientists can answer questions about how the earth’s crust moves and changes through plate tectonics, and how this impacts life in the ocean and on land. Collecting biological samples of living (and past) organisms in these seismically active regions allows us to study how life on earth may have begun, and how organisms have evolved to survive in extreme environments. A team of 30 scientists from around the globe are on board for two months to work on these questions. Hand-in-hand with the amazing technology required to drill deep into the ocean floor, we are collecting the core samples that hold clues to answer these questions. Thank you to everyone today for your great questions! Our Live session is officially over, but we will check back in th following days in case there are any follow-up questions for us to answer. Thanks everyone, science rocks!

Hi Reddit, The International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP) conducts scientific ocean drilling expeditions throughout the world’s oceans in search of clues to Earth’s structure and past. The current expedition is Expedition 362: Sumatra Seismogenic Zone, aboard the U.S. vessel for scientific ocean drilling, the JOIDES Resolution http://www.joidesresolution.org. We want to know why earthquakes happen where and when they do. When earthquakes happen in the ocean, they can displace huge volumes of water and cause tsunamis, such as the 26 December 2004 Sumatra earthquake and the 11 March 2011 Tohoku-Oki (Fukushima) earthquake. The combination of ground shaking and flooding is destructive and deadly. Very large earthquakes like these are typically at subduction zones , places where tectonic plates converge and one plate gets pushed down beneath the other. Yet these earthquakes, as well as several others in the past 15 years, surprised earth scientists in terms of their size and the amount and location of the fault slip during the earthquake. Subduction zone earthquakes can happen many tens or even hundreds of kilometers below Earth’s surface. The shallower and larger the earthquake, the more damage it can cause by shaking. It is even more dangerous if it occurs under the ocean floor because it can trigger a tsunami. We can’t predict earthquakes, but we can learn more about what happens below the Earth’s surface and why rocks break and cause earthquakes that trigger tsunamis. A team of 30 scientists from around the globe are on board for two months to work on these questions. Hand-in-hand with the amazing technology required to drill deep into the ocean floor, we are collecting the core samples that hold clues to answer these questions. We will be back at 12 pm ET, Join us to ask us anything about this intriguing science, how we got here, what we hope to discover, and our lives on board the ship! AMA!

The International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP) conducts scientific ocean drilling expeditions throughout the world’s oceans in search of clues to Earth’s past. The current expedition is Expedition 359: Maldives Monsoon, aboard the U.S. vessel for scientific ocean drilling, the JOIDES Resolution www.joidesresolution.org. On this expedition we are exploring the story of climate change and of times past (paleoclimatic changes). Using core samples from off the coast of the Maldives the scientists aim to reconstruct paleoceanographic evolution over the past 23 million years. Drilling will provide cores required for reconstructing changing current systems through time that are directly related to the evolution of the Indian monsoon. As such the drift deposits will provide a continuous record of Indian monsoon development in the region. One important outcome of Expedition 359 is ground-truthing the hypothesis that the dramatic, pronounced change in the style of the sedimentary carbonate sequence stacking was caused by a combination of relative sea level fluctuations and ocean current system changes. The scientific objectives are to: - explore the variation in regional monsoon systems over multi-million year time scales - learn how scientists reconstruct the causes of fluctuations in ocean currents and triggers of evolution - learn how sea level respond to a warming climate - learn about magnitude and rate of past sea level change A team of 30 scientists from around the globe are on board for two months to work on these questions. Hand-in-hand with the amazing technology required to drill deep into the ocean floor, we are collecting the core samples that hold clues to answer these questions. Join us to ask us anything about this intriguing science, how we got here, what we hope to discover, and our lives on board the ship! Update: Thanks for joining us, we really enjoyed the questions. Some of us are now finished with our 12 hr shift and we’re signing off. Please continue to send questions, visit our website at www.joidesresolution.org, follow us on twitter @TheJR, instagram joides_resolution, and like our www.facebook.com/joidesresolution page!

The International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP) conducts scientific ocean drilling expeditions throughout the world’s oceans in search of clues to Earth’s past. The current expedition is Expedition 356: Indonesian Throughflow, aboard the U.S. vessel for scientific ocean drilling, the JOIDES Resolution (http://www.joidesresolution.org). On this expedition we are investigating the interaction of currents and monsoons in and around Western Australia. We’ll do that by drilling sediment samples from six different sites in the northwest Australian shelf, to see how sediments have changed over the last 5 million years. We’ll use the data we collect to work out how the Indonesian Throughflow and Leeuwin Currents have changed over this time, and the patterns of the northwest Australian monsoon over the same period. We will also use our data to study the movement of the Australian tectonic plate. The scientific objectives are to: Look at the history of the Indonesian throughflow and Leeuwin current a. See how the flow of these currents has affected the development of reef systems Look at how these currents have affected climate a. Understand the history and changes of the Australian monsoon b. Understand the nature and timing of aridity (dryness) in Australia Construct subsidence curves a. Better visualize the vertical movement of the Australian plate b. Investigate changes in sea level c. Look at the subsidence history A team of 30 scientists from around the globe are on board for two months to work on these questions. Hand-in-hand with the amazing technology required to drill deep into the ocean floor, we are collecting the core samples that hold clues to answer these questions. Join us to ask us anything about this intriguing science, how we got here, what we hope to discover, and our lives on board the ship! We will be back at 1 pm ET (10 am PT, 5 pm UTC) to answer your questions, ask us anything!