Until now, oceanographers have subscribed to the overarching view that a conveyor belt-like system circulates the ocean waters from the poles to the equator and back again. Scientists have known that this was an oversimplification, and new research is showing where the ocean superhighway takes some unexpected twists and turns.

Scientists have found evidence that the ocean currents move on different pathways than previously thought, said M. Susan Lozier of Duke University in Durham, N.C., and author of a review of ocean circulation research detailed in the June 18 issue of the journal Science.

Click to view full article: http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2010/0621/Ocean-conveyor-belt-isn-t-as-simple-as-it-sounds

A computer model outlines the Gulf of Mexico’s Loop Current — the same current is the current that a Duke professor, along with other scientists, believes could carry oil up the Carolina coast in a matter of weeks.

“Once it goes through the Florida Straits, which it’s about ready to do, it could be a matter of weeks to months,” Duke Physical Oceanography Professor Susan Lozier said.

Lozier studies large scale ocean circulation at Duke University.

“In general, what’s carried in the Gulf Stream stays off shore of North Carolina in the Gulf stream,” Lozier said.

For full article click: http://abclocal.go.com/wtvd/story?section=news/local&id=7477939

Ithaca Journal, May 16 — Susan Lozier, a physical oceanographer at Duke’s Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions who studies ocean currents and climate change, said she would welcome information researchers collect from narwhals.

Click to view article: http://www.dukenews.duke.edu/2007/05/clips051807.html

Researchers from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and Duke University said the conveyor belt paradigm says the Gulf Stream-warmed ocean releases heat to the atmosphere in the northern North Atlantic, leaving ocean water colder and denser as it moves north. The cold waters then sink and flow southward along the “deep western boundary current” that hugs the continental slope from Canada to the equator. To replace the down-flowing water, warm surface waters from the tropics are pulled northward along the conveyor’s upper limb.

Click to view article: http://www.upi.com/Science_News/2009/05/18/New-North-Atlantic-circulation-path-found/UPI-31721242668417/

With its swirling tornadoes, tidal waves and ice age freezes, “The Day After Tomorrow” also promises to trigger one doozy of a debate over the potentially cataclysmic climate effects of global warming.

The movie, which opens Friday, has scientists and political types lining up to argue that its premise is bogus — that the sort of climate change depicted in it couldn’t possibly happen so fast or dramatically.

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