Watch a visualization of how Earth's oceans impact its atmosphere, weather, and climate.

The top several meters of the world's oceans can hold as much thermal energy as the entire atmosphere.

Learn about various ocean-atmosphere cycles impacting global weather patterns

Although the El Niño-Southern Oscillation is among the most impactful, the North Atlantic Oscillation strongly influences weather patterns in the Northeast US by periodically changing atmospheric pressure over the Atlantic. The North Pacific Oscillation fluctuates atmospheric pressure and sea-surface temperatures that affect winter temperatures over much of the US.

Earth's first oceans may have been as much as 230 degrees Celsius (446 degrees Fahrenheit), with atmospheric pressure preventing them from boiling.

The weight of Earth's atmosphere is equivalent to a 33-foot deep, global ocean

Because air is made up of gas molecules with mass, it is not weightless. On the planet's surface, we are effectively living in what is the equivalent of the bottom of an invisible ocean of these particles pressing against us, just as water molecules do when we are submerged.

By absorbing 90% of the thermal energy trapped by greenhouse gases, oceans are providing increasingly more energy to power the rapid strengthening of hurricanes.

How salt, sunlight, and wind drive ocean currents

The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation plays a critical role in regulating earth's climate, but is threatened by climate change. Explore the effects of temperature, density, and salinity on ocean currents in this 13-minute PBS video.

Visualize water's abundance across the solar system, and its relative rarity on Earth

Despite covering almost three-quarters of its surface, water only makes up about 0.12% of Earth's volume. Water in some of Jupiter's and Saturn's moons comprises a larger share of those celestial bodies and of the total water in the solar system. For example, Jupiter's moon Ganymede is believed to harbor almost nine times Earth's oceans beneath its icy shell.

View the 55 ECVs used to describe Earth's atmospheric conditions

Essential climate variables include physical, chemical, and biological variables that meaningfully contribute to Earth's climate and how it changes with time. Many of these variables influence one another through feedback mechanisms across Earth's atmosphere, hydrosphere, cryosphere, biosphere, and geosphere.

The ocean's ability to store carbon long-term is being hindered by marine heatwaves

More than 4,000 robotic floats with biogeochemical data sensors, including oxygen, pH, nitrate, suspended particles, chlorophyll, temperature, and conductivity, have been deployed as part of the Global Ocean Biogeochemical Array. They have identified changes to ecosystem structure affecting the ocean's ability to transport carbon from surface waters into the deep.

Atmospheric greenhouse gases trap thermal energy and make Earth habitable

The moon and Earth are at the same distance from the sun, but the moon experiences large fluctuations in surface temperature because it lacks an atmosphere to insulate it. Gases such as water vapor, ozone, carbon dioxide, and methane can intercept about 90% of the infrared radiation emitted by Earth's surface.

Climate data is monitored globally using tools from satellites to backyard gauges

Scientists use satellites, balloons, ocean buoys, and land-based instruments to track climate variables like temperature, precipitation, and wind. These tools gather data from deep ocean waters to the upper atmosphere.

Visualizing changes in ocean temperatures between 2016 and 2020

How much does the temperature of the sea change in a given year? This visualization helps illustrate the changes by showing sea surface temperature data from January 2016 through March 2020. Sea surface temperature, which refers to water temperature at the sea's surface, plays a significant role in climate and weather.

Surface ocean currents are primarily driven by wind, tides, and Earth's rotation, while deep-ocean currents are driven by differences in temperature and salt concentration.

Comparing La Niña and El Niño atmosphere-ocean feedback patterns

During La Niña, trade winds reinforce the flow of warm ocean water from the eastern to the western Pacific, allowing colder subsurface water in the eastern Pacific to rise to the surface. These changes reinforce overhead air movements by altering the air temperature near the ocean surface. During El Niño, these trade winds weaken or reverse, preventing upwelling by shifting warm water back to the eastern Pacific and displacing atmospheric circulation patterns.

Discover trends in Earth's climate system: What are indicators of climate change?

A comprehensive deep dive tracking components of the climate system over time, such as temperature, sea level, sea ice amounts, ocean heat, greenhouse gases, and more (w/charts and graphs).

Watch a visualization of global ocean currents from NASA's Estimating the Circulation and Climate of the Ocean project.

The Arctic warms more quickly than the rest of the planet because of the loss of surface ice, a lack of vertical air circulation, and the release of thermal energy as water vapor condenses.

Understanding how the El Niño-Southern Oscillation is affected by climate change

An analysis of El Niño and La Niña patterns from 1901 to 2020 suggests that anthropogenic warming—global warming caused by humans—has at least partly contributed to increased ENSO variability in recent decades. While ENSO increases the likelihood of droughts and flooding across different regions, researchers say these severe weather events are made more extreme by greenhouse gas emissions.

Learn why water can take millions of years to be recycled via the hydrologic cycle

While a single drop of water spends an average of nine days in the atmosphere before precipitating back to Earth, it can spend thousands of years in the ocean before evaporating, and hundreds of thousands of years deep in rock layers before being released as steam in volcanic eruptions. Some water molecules have been trapped in Antarctic ice sheets for millions of years since they last moved through the water cycle.

Excluding water vapor, greenhouse gases make up less than 1% of Earth's atmosphere

Although carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, ozone, and most fluorinated gases account for only a minority of the planet's greenhouse effect due to their lower concentrations, they are more effective at trapping thermal radiation. While water vapor condenses within two weeks, other greenhouse gases linger in the atmosphere for years on average.

Differences in pressure and temperature between atmospheric gases create wind

Because Earth's surface is not uniformly heated by the sun at all times, pockets of warmer and cooler air will form and interact. Warmer pockets of less dense air will rise, leaving gaps for cooler, denser air to move in. Wind is this movement of air from high-pressure to low-pressure areas.

View a diagram of Earth's atmosphere, which is composed of five layers

Starting from the surface, the troposphere is home to Earth's weather, followed by the stratosphere, which houses the ozone layer, and the mesosphere, which burns up most debris from space. Above these layers lies the thermosphere, where auroras are produced, and the exosphere, which lacks a clear outer boundary as it fades into outer space.

Soil is the largest terrestrial carbon sink on the planet, storing almost twice as much carbon as the atmosphere and all living plants and animals combined.

How the loss of Earth's atmosphere would cause oceans to boil at freezing temperatures

Many phenomena requiring air pressure, from the flight of birds and aircraft to the act of breathing, would no longer be possible. Because sound travels through vibrating air molecules, the loss of the planet's atmosphere would also create a silent environment. Even during daytime hours, the sky would resemble a clear night sky.

If Earth's water were suddenly replaced with air, forest fires would burn most of the world's vegetation within years.

Clouds' subtle climate effects require significant computational power to simulate

Responsible for reflecting sunlight and preventing thermal energy from entering the Earth system while also trapping energy and keeping it in the system, clouds are understood to substantially influence climate predictions. Because even supercomputers struggle to accurately model their dynamic behavior, researchers have used AI to indirectly incorporate clouds into climate models.

How jet streams and US weather are affected by the El Niño-Southern Oscillation

Jet streams are predominantly west-to-east air currents in the atmosphere that mark the boundary between cold polar air and warm tropical air, where cells of atmospheric circulation meet. By disrupting the location of these circulations on two- to seven-year cycles, ENSO alters the probability of droughts, floods, and above- or below-average temperatures across the US.

Hypotheses on the origins of Earth's water, from comets and asteroids to magma oceans

Before Earth's atmosphere formed, any liquid water would have boiled off, preventing the accumulation of water early on to create today's oceans. Planetary scientists continue to debate whether this water was delivered later from comet or asteroid collisions or via reactions between iron oxide in Earth's molten surface and hydrogen gas from the planetary nebula.

Available data suggest that while hurricane frequency has not increased over the past century, average hurricane intensity has, a trend scientists attribute to rising air and ocean temperatures.

El Niño and La Niña are Pacific Ocean climate patterns that affect global weather

El Niño causes warm water to move east, disrupting ocean life and bringing wetter conditions to the southern US and drier ones to the North. La Niña strengthens the usual wind patterns, triggering cooler northern winters and more storms in the Pacific Northwest.

How Earth's 'greenhouse effect' works

The so-called "greenhouse effect," where various gases in Earth's atmosphere trap heat from the sun, is a crucial factor in our planet's ability to sustain life. It's also pivotal in discussions over humanity's impact on changes in the Earth's...

Carbon sinks absorb more greenhouse gases than they produce

The largest on Earth are oceans, which capture 25% of all carbon emissions and 90% of excess atmospheric thermal radiation while generating half of the world's oxygen. Wildfires and deforestation have reduced forests' net sink capacity, though fungi are believed to capture and store over a third of global carbon emissions.

While El Niño moves warm Pacific Ocean waters east along the equator, La Niña moves them west, shifting where rainfall will become more common for months.

Carbon dioxide acts as a 'control knob' for Earth's climate

Although Earth's ice ages were primarily triggered by slow changes in the planet's orbit—known as Milankovitch cycles—these changes do not explain the extreme temperature swings during glacial periods. Carbon dioxide acts as a feedback mechanism, intensifying both cooling during ice ages and warming during their ends by reinforcing the initial changes sparked by orbital shifts.

Earth's oceans do mix, despite viral images and videos claiming to show boundaries between oceans that waters do not cross.

Why the ratios of helium isotopes are analyzed to investigate ocean circulation

Volcanic activity on the seafloor produces high ratios of helium-3 to helium-4, which can be tracked in ocean samples more easily than other elements because helium is nonreactive. Water from deep ocean currents can also be distinguished from air-exposed surface water sources by comparing these ratios, since atmospheric helium ratios are much lower.

A breakdown of Earth's atmospheric layers, including why it can get colder or hotter with altitude

Gases in the troposphere—the atmosphere's lowest layer—cool with increasing height as they get farther from the thermal energy emitted by Earth's warm surface. In the next layer—the stratosphere—ozone is increasingly heated by the sun's ultraviolet radiation with height. Because cooler air sinks and hotter air rises, the cooler troposphere and hotter stratosphere form a natural boundary keeping Earth's weather in the lowest layer.

Explore Earth's future climate under different levels of warming

An incredible interactive project showing how global warming is projected to affect the world, from temperatures to rainfall, droughts and flooding, and more.

An overview of Earth's atmospheric cells and how they distribute Earth's uneven heating

The Hadley, Ferrel, and Polar cells are circulation patterns that act like gears, moving warmer air from the equator to the poles. The rising and falling of air currents within these patterns creates semi-persistent regions of low and high pressure, which contribute to the formation of regional climates, such as tropical zones.

How does climate change impact hurricanes?

Statistical relationships between sea surface temperature and hurricanes, analysis of century-scale Atlantic tropical storm and hurricane records, analysis of other observed Atlantic hurricane metrics, and more.

View an illustrative guide to climate change for kids

While climates have changed throughout Earth's history, they are now changing faster than usual, driven by the burning of fossil fuels and the release of greenhouse gases, which trap more of the sun's radiation.

The Amazon rainforest is considered the 'lungs of the Earth,' but it contributes less than a quarter of the oxygen of phytoplankton—microscopic plants, algae, and bacteria capable of photosynthesis.

The weather time machine

A fun interactive on how old ships’ logs are giving scientists new insights into the past and future of the Earth’s changing climate (w/maps and pictures).

About 99% of Earth's atmosphere is made of nitrogen and oxygen

At 78% and 21% respectively, the two elements are followed by argon with almost 1%. Trace amounts of other molecules, including greenhouse gases such as methane and carbon dioxide, and particulate matter such as dust and pollen, make up the remainder of the atmosphere's contents.

Explore an interactive global weather map, with overlays depicting real-time data on temperature, precipitation, wind, humidity, and pressure, which enable the tracking and monitoring of extreme weather events.

Earth's oceans, which have an average depth of 3.7 kilometers (2.3 miles), may be divided into zones based on depth or the abundance of light.

Satellites in low Earth orbit can experience changes in their orbits due to shifts in solar activity, which alter the amount of energy Earth's atmosphere receives and its resulting density.

Global climate models simulate Earth system interactions and how human activity impacts climate

By splitting the planet into tiny 3D grid cells, supercomputers can run thousands of equations for each cell to determine the movement of energy, moisture, and other elements across Earth. The equations can also incorporate greenhouse gases to determine how humans affect the climate.

Climate change is increasing the frequency and intensity of severe turbulence

Severe turbulence over the North Atlantic has increased by 55% over the past 40 years, driven by strengthened jet streams and storm systems. Ongoing increases in global temperatures, which fuel these changes, may triple severe turbulence incidents in the coming decades.

Scientists can determine Earth's past climate conditions by analyzing air trapped in microscopic bubbles within ice cores—columns of compressed snow layers that build up over hundreds of thousands of years.