This dataset is comprised of CTD temperature, salinity and potential temperature collected using seal tags. Data were collected as part of the NERC-funded project 'Ocean processes over the southern Weddell Sea shelf using seal tags'. Data were not collected as part of a cruise as seals were used as data activity platforms. 20 Weddell seals were tagged at the eastern end of the shelf-break north of the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf between 11 February 2011 and 03 May 2011. The aims of the project were: 1. The resulting data from the seals’ dives will provide the most comprehensive picture to date of the ocean conditions over the southern Weddell Sea continental shelf. 2. By mapping the temperature of the water near the sea floor it will be possible to determine the locations where dense waters leave the shelf, and the processes involved: either a direct flow down the slope under gravity, or initially mixing at the shelf edge with waters from off the shelf before descending down the slope. 3. To determine where the source waters come onto the shelf. 4. Though the research was primarily oceanographic, the movements and diving behaviour provide insight to seal biologists studying the animals' beahviour. Data were collected as part of NERC standard grants NE/G014086/1 and NE/G014833/1. NE/G014086/1 was the lead grant and was led by Dr Keith William Nicholls of NERC British Antarctic Survey, Science Programmes and runs from 01 April 2010 to 31 December 2018. The secondary grant, NE/G014833/1, was led by Professor Michael Fedak of University of St Andrews, Sea Mammal Research Unit and runs from 01 October 2010 to 28 February 2014. The seal tag CTD data have been received by BODC and are currently available in original format upon request.

A collection of raw water temperature-depth-time profiles were recorded from a selection of dive computers, underwater cameras and baseline Castaway microCTD devices. Data were collected at Oban recompression chamber (owned and managed by Tritonia Scientific), as well as during sea dives local to 56.42 N, 5.47W, over a two-week period between 08/01/2020 and 07/02/2020. A number of different devices and models were tested during the study. Chamber dives were undertaken to test and compare device response time (29 devices over 11 dives) and accuracy (6 replicate dives). This was followed by local sea dives to further compare device accuracy. During each pair of sea dives (6 total), half of the devices were mounted on a frame with the remainder worn by two divers. For the subsequent dives in each pair, each device was switched to the alternate mounting position. Dive profiles were exported from individual dive computers into Subsurface open source software, then exported in ssrf (XML) format for each week of data collection. Profiles from all dive computers were combined for analysis. Castaway microCTDs and Paralenz Dive Camera+ profiles were exported as individual CSV files per dive. Data were collected as part of Celia Marlowe’s PhD project at the University of East Anglia, which aimed to assess the precision, accuracy and uncertainty in water temperature profiles collected from devices commonly carried by Scuba divers. The PhD project is part of the Next Generation Unmanned Systems Science (NEXUSS) Centre for Doctoral Training, funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and the Engineering and Physical Science Research Council (EPSRC) (NE/N012070/1), and is additionally supported by Cefas Seedcorn (DP901D). The diving and chamber tests were supported through a NERC National Facility for Scientific Diving grant (NFSD/17/02).

For around a decade, southern elephant seals (mirounga leonina) have been used to collect hydrographic (temperature & salinity) profiles in the Southern Ocean. CTD-SRDLs (Conductivity Temperature Depth –Satellite Relayed Data Loggers) attached to seals' heads in Antarctic and sub-Antarctic locations measure water property profiles during dives and transmit data using the ARGOS (Advanced Research & Global Observation Satellite) network (Fedak 2013). CTD-SRDLs are built by the Sea Mammal Research Unit (SMRU, University of St Andrews, UK); they include miniaturised CTD units made by Valeport Ltd. When seals are foraging at sea 2.5 profiles can be obtained daily, on average. Profiles average 500m depth, but can be 2000m in extreme cases (Boehme et al. 2009, Roquet et al. 2011). Deployment efforts have been very intensive in the Southern Indian Ocean, with biannual campaigns in the Kerguelen Islands since 2004 and many deployments in Davis and Casey Antarctic stations (Roquet et al., 2013) more recently. 207 CTD-SRDL tags have been deployed there, giving about 75,000 hydrographic profiles in the Kerguelen Plateau area. About two thirds of the dataset was obtained between 2011 & 2013 as a consequence of intensive Australian Antarctic station deployments. There is also regular data since 2004 from French and Franco-Australian Kerguelen Island deployments. Although not included here, many CTD-SRDL tags deployed in the Kerguelen Islands included a fluorimeter. Fluorescence profiles can be used as a proxy for chlorophyll content (Guinet et al. 2013, Blain et al. 2013). Seal-derived hydrographic data have been used successfully to improve understanding of elephant seal foraging strategies and their success (Biuw et al., 2007, Bailleul, 2007). They provide detailed hydrographic observations in places and seasons with virtually no other data sources (Roquet et al. 2009, Ohshima et al. 2013, Roquet et al. 2013). Hydrographic data available in this dataset were edited using an Argo-inspired procedure and then visually. Each CTD-SRDL dataset was adjusted using several delayed-mode techniques, including a temperature offset correction and a linear-in-pressure salinity correction - described in Roquet et al. (2011). Adjusted hydrographic data have estimated accuracies of about +/-0.03oC and +/-0.05 psu (practical salinity unit). The salinity accuracy depends largely on the distribution of CTD data for any given CTD-SRDL, which decides the quality of adjustment parameters. Adjustments are best when hydrographic profiles are available in the region between the Southern Antarctic Circumpolar Current Front and the Antarctic divergence (55oS-62oS latitude range in the Southern Indian Ocean). Several institutes provided funding for the associated programs and the logistics necessary for the fieldwork. The observatory MEMO (Mammifères Echantillonneurs du Milieu Marin), funded by CNRS institutes (INSU and INEE), carried out the French contribution to the study. The project received financial and logistical support from CNES (TOSCA program), the Institut Paul-Emile Victor (IPEV), the Total Foundation and ANR. MEMO is associated with the Coriolis centre, part of the SOERE consortium CTD02 (Coriolis-temps différé Observations Océaniques, PI: G. Reverdin), which distributes real-time and delayed-mode products. The Australian contribution came from the Australian Animal Tracking and Monitoring System, an Integrated Marine Observing System (IMOS) facility. The work was also supported by the Australian Government's Cooperative Research Centres Programme via the Antarctic Climate & Ecosystem Cooperative Research Centre. The University of Tasmania and Macquarie University's Animal Ethics Committees approved the animal handling. Both tagging programs are part of the MEOP (Marine Mammals Exploring the Oceans Pole to Pole) international consortium - an International Polar Year (IPY) project.

This data collection consists of sea surface temperature (SST) data collected by recreational surfers around the southern UK and Western Ireland coastline over the period from 5th January 2014 to 8th February 2017. These data were collected as part of a research project supported by Plymouth Marine Laboratory. Over the study period, the recreational surfers collected 297 independent samples of SST. The surfers were equipped with a UTBI-001 Tidbit V2 Temperature Data Logger and a Garmin etrex 10 GPS. The Garmin etrex 10 device was used to extract GPS information (latitude and longitude) for each surf. The Tidbit V2 temperature logger was attached, using cable-ties, at mid-point to the leash of the surfboards to ensure continuous contact with seawater when surfing, measuring temperature in the top metre of the water column. Roughly every 6 months over the study period, the Tidbit V2 temperature loggers were rigorously compared with a VWR1620-200 traceable digital thermometer (with an accuracy of 0.05 degrees C at the range of 0 to 100 degrees C) at 1 degree C intervals from 6 to 25 degrees C using a PolyScience temperature bath. Over the study period, all sensors performed within the manufacturers technical specifications. A piecewise regression to model was used to correct any Tidbit V2 temperature data collected to remove systematic biases between sensors, such that the errors in each sensor were within the accuracy of VWR1620-200 traceable digital thermometer. Temperature data were collected at 10 second intervals during each surfing session. The data were processed to remove any data collected before and after entering the water and SST were extracted by computing the median of the remaining data. Standard deviations on the remaining data are also provided to give an index of SST variability during each surf session.

Seawater samples were collected from a series of ships of opportunity transiting between the UK and the Caribbean. Crossings occured almost monthly between May 2002 and October 2017. Roughly 90-100 samples were collected for each return journey from the ships' underway system and were frozen immediately for subsequent laboratory analysis. Nitrate, silicate, and phosphate levels were measured from these seawater samples. This work was funded by 5 different projects over the years - The Carbon variability studies by ships of opportunity (2000-2003), CARBOOCEAN FP6 (2001-2009), Carbochange (2011-2015), FixO3 (2013-2016), and NERC Greenhouse Gas most recently.

This dataset comprises Acoustic Wave and Current (AWAC) profiler data collected in the coastal waters of St Vincent, in the Caribbean Sea. The data were collected betewen 26th July 2018 and 10th October 2018 and 15th January 2019 to 20th March 2019 as part fo two deployments. An AWAC profiler was deployed at approximately 10 metres depth in the shallow coastal waters, south of Georgetown, St Vincent. The dataset is part of the Commonwealth Marine Economies Programme which was launched in 2016 to help support the marine economies of commonwealth small island developing states (SIDS).

These seabed and sea surface light data were collected in the Bay of Brest, Brittany, France, in 2011-2012. R.V. Albert Lucas and smaller vessels were used for deployment and recovery of the seabed light sensor instrumentation. Corresponding time series records of seabed and sea surface irradiance were collected. Water depth above, and water temperature at the position of the sensor were also recorded. The data were collected as part of a project studying the effect of tidal variations in water depth and clarity on the light that reaches the seabed (Roberts et al., 2014; Roberts, 2015). They were collected by Bangor University scientists (primarily E.M. Roberts), assisted by contacts at the Centre d'Etudes Techniques Maritimes et Fluviales (CETMEF, now Cerema) and the Institut Universitaire Europeen de al Mer (IUEM).

The GEBCO_2019 Grid is a global continuous terrain model for ocean and land with a spatial resolution of 15 arc seconds. The grid uses as a ‘base’ Version 1 of the SRTM15_plus data set (Sandwell et al). This data set is a fusion of land topography with measured and estimated seafloor topography. It is largely based on version 11 of SRTM30_plus (5). Included on top of this base grid are gridded bathymetric data sets developed by the four Regional Centers of The Nippon Foundation-GEBCO Seabed 2030 Project, and from a number of international and national data repositories and regional mapping initiatives. The GEBCO_2019 Grid represents all data within the 2019 compilation. The compilation of the GEBCO_2019 Grid was carried out at the Seabed 2030 Global Center, hosted at the National Oceanography Centre, UK, with the aim of producing a seamless global terrain model. The majority of the compilation was done using the 'remove-restore' procedure (Smith and Sandwell, 1997; Becker, Sandwell and Smith, 2009 and Hell and Jakobsson, 2011). This is a two stage process of computing the difference between the new data and the ‘base’ grid and then gridding the difference and adding the difference back to the existing ‘base’ grid. The aim is to achieve a smooth transition between the 'new' and 'base' data sets with the minimum of perturbation of the existing base data set. The data sets supplied in the form of complete grids (primarily areas north of 60N and south of 50S) were included using feather blending techniques from GlobalMapper software. The GEBCO_2019 Grid has been developed through the Nippon Foundation-GEBCO Seabed 2030 Project. This is a collaborative project between the Nippon Foundation of Japan and the General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans (GEBCO). It aims to bring together all available bathymetric data to produce the definitive map of the world ocean floor by 2030 and make it available to all. Funded by the Nippon Foundation, the four Seabed 2030 Regional Centers include the Southern Ocean - hosted at the Alfred Wegener Institute, Germany; South and West Pacific Ocean - hosted at the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, New Zealand; Atlantic and Indian Oceans - hosted at the Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory, Columbia University, USA; Arctic and North Pacific Oceans - hosted at Stockholm University, Sweden and the Center for Coastal and Ocean Mapping at the University of New Hampshire, USA).

The International Bathymetric Chart of the Arctic Ocean (IBCAO) Version 4.0 is a gridded continuous terrain model covering ocean and land of the Arctic region. The grid has been compiled from data covering approximately 14.2 percent of the Arctic seafloor with multibeam bathymetry and about 5.5 percent with other sources, excluding digitized depth contours. The grid-cell size (resolution) is 200x200 m on a Polar Stereographic projection, with the true scale set at a latitude of 75 deg N and a central meridian of 0 deg. The horizontal datum is WGS 84 and the vertical datum is assumed Mean Sea Level. IBCAO Version 4.0 has been compiled with support from the Nippon Foundation-GEBCO-Seabed 2030 Project, an international effort whose goal it is to see the entire world ocean mapped by 2030. A geographic version of the Polar Stereographic grid serves as input to the General Bathymetric Chart of Oceans (GEBCO) global gridded terrain model.

Data from this project is a UK contribution to a US research cruise that aimed to examine the impact of wave breaking and bubble processes on air-sea gas exchange. Measurements were made of whitecap fraction, wave state, wave bubble statistics and bubble properties beneath breaking waves on the R/V Knorr KN213-3 cruise departing Nuuk, Greenland October 9, 2013 arriving at Woods Hole, USA on November 12, 2013. Instruments and platforms used included an 11 meter long free-floating spar buoy equipped with wave wires, a bubble camera, acoustic resonators, a Waverider buoy and ship measurements of aerosol fluxes. Data generation were funded by NERC parent grant NE/J020893/1 awarded to Professor Ian Brooks and associated child grants NE/J020540/1 and NE/J022373/2 awarded to Mr Robin Pascal and Dr Helen Czerski respectively.