A team of Australian and Japanese scientists, in a study published in the journal Nature Geoscience on Sunday (4/25/2010), found, is an important part of current global ocean circulation patterns that help monitor the planet's climate.
Scientists previously have detected evidence of these currents but did not have data on it.
"We do not know if it is part of the circulation is important or not and this shows clearly that it is part of circulation," said a study author Steve Rintoul told Reuters correspondent David Fogarty on climate change.
Rintoul, from the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Cooperative Research Center in Hobart, said it proved to be an ocean current in the most rapid ever found, with an average speed of 20 centimeters. These currents are also found to carry more than 12 million cubic meters of very cold salt water per second from the Antarctic.
"At a depth of three kilometers below the surface of this water, this is the speed of the strongest ever recorded and we've seen so far. It really surprised us," he said.
He said the current was carrying oxygen-rich water that submerged much of Antarctica into the ocean in a river valley further to the north in the vicinity of Kerguelen Plateau in the southern Indian Ocean and then branched out.
Belt global introduction
Flows that form part of the network of a much larger stretching all the oceans of the world, and act like a giant belt introduction to distribute heat throughout the world.
Ocean also is the main storage of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas that spread naturally and by human activities, mainly from burning fossil fuels.
For example, the Gulf Stream bringing warm water into the North Atlantic, northern Europe and provides a relatively moderate climate. The failure of these flows, which have occurred in the past, many parts of Europe would be plunged into a severe frost, the scientists said.
"The current in it along with the Kerguelen Plateau is part of a global system of ocean currents called the circulation of turn, which determines how much heat and carbon that can be smoked by the ocean," said Rintoul.
A significant portion of the circulation that is the formation of very many volume of salt water is very cold in some areas along the coast of Antarctica which then sank to the bottom and flows into another valley ocean.
The team held measuring devices are anchored to the seabed at a depth of up to 4.5 kilometers and noted the content of salt, temperature and flow speeds over the past two years.
"Measurement continually given by the fixation that allows us, for the first time, determine how much water is carried by the currents in the north," said Rintoul.
He said the issue is important to predict whether the climate is turning circulation will continue to hang on to power at this time or whether the flow is sensitive to changes such as climate change.
That means measuring a further increase of speed and volume of the cold salt water that is created around Antarctica.
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