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 Summaries

This section contains presentations that describe the contents of the data in the Continuously Managed Data base, CMD, at the U.S. NODC as well as what is available from the real-time archives. Presentations listed below the heading "CMD Data" show the characteristics of the data in the CMD. Presentations listed below the heading "Real-time Data" show the data available from the real-time archives at MEDS within days of data collection.

The term high resolution (bottle, CTD, XBT data) is used to mean data that are sampled usually at 1 or 2 m resolution. Low resolution data are those profiles that have been reduced by some process and normally are transmitted in real-time (BATHYs - temperature vs depth and TESACs - temperature, salinity vs depth).

CMD Data
This section portrays information about the data which are available from the CMD at the U.S. NODC as of December, 1997.

• Division into oceans: A map showing how the data have been split into the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian ocean areas.
  
  
• Number of profiles in the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Oceans: This shows the number of profiles of different types that are available in each ocean area.
  
  
• Sampling plots:These portray in how many months each year there exist temperature profiles from a 5x5 degree latitude and longitude grid.
  
  
• Station location plots: These show the locations of data by quarter of the year.
  
  
• Atlantic Ocean properties: These were prepared by AOML and show mean temperatures at 6 depths, data availability, variance, amplitude and phase of the annual harmonic.
  
• Pacific Ocean properties: These were prepared by Warren White at Scripps. Samples are shown of sea surface temperature anomalies, temperature anomalies at 400m and heat storage anomalies from 0-400 for the years 1990 to 1994. All of these are for January to February only. A complete set of figures from 1955 to 1994 is shown at the Scripps web site. Use the Scripps link to see these.

Real-time Data
This section portrays information about the real-time data available. This is provided so that potential users of such data can know how much data are processed this way, from where they are received and how quickly the data can become available. If you are interested in gaining access to these data in real-time, contact Bob Keeley (keeley@meds-sdmm.dfo-mpo.gc.ca) at MEDS.

• Distribution and sampling of BATHYs: These show the approximate volume of BATHY data available year by year.
  
  
• Distribution and sampling of TESACs: These show the approximate volume of TESAC data available year by year.
  
  
• Timeliness: These show some of the characteristics of how quickly real-time data become available to users.
  
  
• Station location plots: These show the locations of real-time data by year.