Description: Large amounts of the greenhouse gas methane are released from the seabed to the water column where it may be consumed by aerobic methanotrophic bacteria. This microbial filter is consequently the last marine sink for methane before its liberation to the atmosphere. The size and activity of methanotrophic communities, which determine the capacity of the water column methane filter, are thought to be mainly controlled by nutrient and redox dynamics, but little is known about the effects of ocean currents. Here, we report measurements of methanotrophic activity and biomass (CARD-FISH) at methane seeps west of Svalbard, and related them to physical water mass properties (CTD) and modelled current dynamics. We show that cold bottom water containing a large number of aerobic methanotrophs was rapidly displaced by warmer water with a considerably smaller methanotrophic community. This water mass exchange, caused by short-term variations of the West Spitsbergen Current, constitutes a rapid oceanographic switch severely reducing methanotrophic activity in the water column. Strong and fluctuating currents are widespread oceanographic features common at many methane seep systems and are thus likely to globally affect methane oxidation in the ocean water column.

Description: We present high-resolution resistivity imaging of gas hydrate pipe-like structures, as derived from marine controlled-source electromagnetic (CSEM) inversions that combine towed and ocean-bottom electric field receiver data, acquired from the Nyegga region, offshore Norway. Two-dimensional CSEM inversions applied to the towed receiver data detected four new prominent vertical resistive features that are likely gas hydrate structures, located in proximity to a major gas hydrate pipe-like structure, known as the CNE03 pockmark. The resistivity model resulting from the CSEM data inversion resolved the CNE03 hydrate structure in high resolution, as inferred by comparison to seismically constrained inversions. Our results indicate that shallow gas hydrate vertical features can be delineated effectively by inverting both ocean-bottom and towed receiver CSEM data simultaneously. The approach applied here can be utilised to map and monitor seafloor mineralisation, freshwater reservoirs, CO2 sequestration sites and near-surface geothermal systems.

Description: High-resolution 2D seismic reflection data during research cruise MSM63 in April/May 2017 onboard RV Maria S. Merian. The seismic profiles were acquired with a two-105/105-in3-GI-Gun-array shot at 210 bar every 5 seconds and a 150 m-long streamer with 96 channels and 1.5625 m channel spacing. The resulting shot point distance is approximately 8.75-12.5 m at 3.5-5 kn ship speed. The frequency range of the two-GI-Gun-array is 15-500 Hz. The processing included geometry and delay corrections, static corrections, binning to 1.5625 m and bandpass filtering with corner frequencies of 25, 45, 420, and 500 Hz. Furthermore, a normal-move-out-correction (with a constant velocity of 1488 m/s calculated from CTD measurements) was applied and the data were stacked and then migrated using a 2D Stolt algorithm (1500 m/s constant velocity model). Sub-bottom profiler data acquired during cruise MSM63 using Parasound P70 with 4 kHz as the secondary low frequency to obtain seismic images of the upper 100 m below the seafloor with very high vertical resolution (〈 15 cm). We applied a frequency filter (low cut 2 kHz, high cut 6 kHz, 2 iterations) and calculated the envelope within the seismic interpretation software IHS Kingdom. Bathymetric data were acquired with the EM712 system mounted to the hull of RV Maria S. Merian. The survey was designed to provide high-resolution bathymetry with 5 x 5 m resolution. We processed the data using MB Systems software (Caress & Chayes, 2017) and included statistical evaluation of soundings that increased the signal-to-noise ratio. The sound velocity profile for multibeam processing was measured at the beginning and at the end of the cruise.

Description: High-resolution 2D seismic reflection data during research cruise MSM63 in April/May 2017 onboard RV Maria S. Merian. The seismic profiles were acquired with a two-105/105-in3-GI-Gun-array shot at 210 bar every 5 seconds and a 150 m-long streamer with 96 channels and 1.5625 m channel spacing. The resulting shot point distance is approximately 8.75-12.5 m at 3.5-5 kn ship speed. The frequency range of the two-GI-Gun-array is 15-500 Hz. The processing included geometry and delay corrections, static corrections, binning to 1.5625 m and bandpass filtering with corner frequencies of 25, 45, 420, and 500 Hz. Furthermore, a normal-move-out-correction (with a constant velocity of 1488 m/s calculated from CTD measurements) was applied and the data were stacked and then migrated using a 2D Stolt algorithm (1500 m/s constant velocity model).

Description: Bathymetric data were acquired with the EM712 system mounted to the hull of RV Maria S. Merian (Figure 1). The survey was designed to provide high-resolution bathymetry with 5 x 5 m resolution. We processed the data using MB Systems software (Caress & Chayes, 2017) and included statistical evaluation of soundings that increased the signal-to-noise ratio. The sound velocity profile for multibeam processing was measured at the beginning and at the end of the cruise.

Description: Sub-bottom profiler data acquired during cruise MSM63 using Parasound P70 with 4 kHz as the secondary low frequency to obtain seismic images of the upper 100 m below the seafloor with very high vertical resolution (〈 15 cm). We applied a frequency filter (low cut 2 kHz, high cut 6 kHz, 2 iterations) and calculated the envelope within the seismic interpretation software IHS Kingdom.

Description: The seismic data were acquired north of the Knipovich Ridge on the western Svalbard margin during cruise MSM21/4. They were recorded using a Geometrics GeoEel streamer of either 120 channels (profiles p100-p208) or 88 channels (profiles p300-p805) with a group spacing of 1.56 m and a sampling rate of 2 kHz. A GI-Gun (2×1.7 l) with a main frequency of ~150 Hz was used as a source and operated at a shot interval of 6-8 s. Processing of profiles p100-p208 and p600-p805: Positions for each channel were calculated by backtracking along the profiles from the GI-Gun GPS positions. The shot gathers were analyzed for abnormal amplitudes below the seafloor reflection by comparing neighboring traces in different frequency bands within sliding time windows. To suppress surface-generated water noise, a tau-p filter was applied in the shot gather domain. Common mid-point (CMP) profiles were then generated through crooked-line binning with a CMP spacing of 1.5625 m. A zero-phase band-pass filter with corner frequencies of 60 Hz and 360 Hz was applied to the data. Based on regional velocity information from MCS data [Sarkar, 2012], an interpolated and extrapolated 3D interval velocity model was created below the digitized seafloor reflection of the high-resolution streamer data. This velocity model was used to apply a CMP stack and an amplitude-preserving Kirchhoff post-stack time migration. Processing of profiles p400-p500: Data were sampled at 0.5 ms and sorted into common midpoint (CMP) domain with a bin spacing of 5 m. Normal move out correction was carried out with a velocity of 1500 m s-1 and an Ormsby bandpass filter with corner frequencies at 40, 80, 600 and 1000 Hz was applied. The data were time migrated using the water velocity.