World Ocean Database Project - Comparison of World Ocean Databases

Comparison of World Ocean Databases

The World Ocean Database was first released in 1994 and updates have been released approximately every four years, 1998, 2001, and 2005. The most recent World Ocean Database series, WOD09, was released in September 2009. The WOD09 has more than 9 million temperature profiles and 3.6 million salinity profiles. The table shows a comparison of the number of stations by instrument type in WOD09 with previous NODC/WDC global ocean databases.

Instrument Type NODC (1974) NODC (1991) WOA94 WOD98 WOD01 WOD05 WOD09
OSD 425,000 783,912 1,194,407 1,373,440 2,121,042 2,258,437 2,541,298
CTD na 66,450 89,000 189,555 311,943 443,953 641,845
MBT 775,000 980,377 1,922,170 2,077,200 2,376,206 2,421,940 2,426,749
XBT 290,000 704,424 1,281,942 1,537,203 1,743,590 1,930,413 2,104,490
MRB na na na 107,715 297,936 445,371 566,544
DRB na na na na 50,549 108,564 121,828
PFL na na na na 22,637 168,988 547,985
UOR na na na na 37,645 46,699 88,190
APB na na na na 75,665 75,665 88,583
GLD na na na na na 338 5,857
Total Stations 1,490,000 2,535,163 4,487,519 5,285,113 7,037,213 7,900,368 9,133,369
Plankton na na na 83,650 142,900 150,250 218,695
SUR na na na na 4,743 9,178 9,178

Read more about this topic:  World Ocean Database Project

Famous quotes containing the words comparison, world and/or ocean:

    Intolerance respecting other people’s religion is toleration itself in comparison with intolerance respecting other people’s art.
    Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)

    People always ask us, “Are things better or worse today?” Well, some things are better and some things are worse.... But there are a lot of problems in the world today that no one dreamed of when we were young. For instance, this business about the environment. Why, clean water was just something you took for granted.
    Sarah Delany (b. 1890)

    They commonly celebrate those beaches only which have a hotel on them, not those which have a humane house alone. But I wished to see that seashore where man’s works are wrecks; to put up at the true Atlantic House, where the ocean is land-lord as well as sea-lord, and comes ashore without a wharf for the landing; where the crumbling land is the only invalid, or at best is but dry land, and that is all you can say of it.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)