What is hypoxia?
Hypoxia, or low oxygen, is an environmental phenomenon where the concentration of dissolved oxygen in the water column decreases to a level that can no longer support living aquatic organisms. Hypoxic areas, or “Dead Zones,” have increased in duration and frequency across our planet’s oceans since first being noted in the 1970s.
The largest hypoxic zone currently affecting the United States, and the second largest hypoxic zone worldwide, is the northern Gulf of Mexico adjacent to the Mississippi River.
Gulf hypoxia in the news:
Gulf of Mexico ‘dead zone’ will persist for decades
By Doyle Rice / USA Today March 26, 2018 The annual “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico, which last year was the size of New Jersey, will continue for several decades, a new study said. A [...]
Study: ‘Legacy’ nitrogen also feeds Gulf of Mexico dead zone
By JANET McCONNAUGHEY/ AP Mar. 22, 2018 NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The Gulf of Mexico’s “dead zone” will be an unwanted summer visitor for decades, Canadian scientists say. They say the oxygen-starved patch would persist [...]
Gulf of Mexico expert discusses “Dead Zone”
The Shell Oil Endowed Chair in Oceanography and Coastal Sciences at Louisiana State University Nancy N. Rabalais speaks on a growing concern to the Gulf of Mexico, a hypoxic zone where organisms struggle to [...]
A U.S. farm bill even a butterfly could love?
Photo courtesy of Mike Reese Andy McGlashen / Ensia March 20, 2018 Sometime soon — maybe this year, maybe next — biologist Jeffrey Glassberg expects to say goodbye to the Poweshiek skipperling. The [...]
Study Characterizes Dissolved Organic Carbon Cycling in the Northern Gulf of Mexico
GULF OF MEXICO RESEARCH INITIATIVE MARCH 20, 2018 Researchers analyzed dissolved organic carbon from water column samples collected in five regions to establish baseline data about its relative persistence and cycling in the northern Gulf [...]
Taming the mighty Mississippi
By Todd C. Frankel / The Washington Post March 14, 2018 A picaresque tour of infrastructure reveals a struggle for control all along America’s great river, full of questions about what it once was, doubts about [...]
Easing pressure on levees, raising environmental worries
By Stacey Plaisance and Kevin McGill / AP News March 8, 2018 NORCO, La. (AP) — The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers began opening part of a 1930s flood control structure northwest of New Orleans [...]