My name is Anna, I am Italian, but I have moved to the Netherlands four years ago, after getting my Master in Physics, to work on my PhD project in Physical Oceanography, to see a little bit how life is in another country, and to test my waterproof skills (in case you do not know, in the Netherlands it rains a lot..)

During these years I have learned (and still learning) many things, not only about my scientific topic, and science in general, but also on how to survive in a foreign country, how to improve your English very quickly (if you want to buy something to eat!), and how to deal with people coming from different countries.
Also, I have been surprised about how different Italy and Italians look like from another perspective.
All these ingredients make my staying in the Netherlands a great professional and personal experience, and I am always extremely grateful to my professor, that gave me the opportunity to embark in this big adventure.

And now, about my work…

I am studying “internal waves”, that are fascinating waves living deep inside the ocean. Actually, not only in the ocean, but also in lakes, in our Earth atmosphere, in the Earth core, or in the atmospheres of other planets or stars: they are everywhere! You just need a fluid that rotates (as all fluids on Earth, of course!), or that is “stratified” (like the ocean, where saltier, heavier water lies below fresher, lighter water), and voilà’, you get “internal waves”.
But my focus, happily for me, is the big blue Ocean.

These waves are fascinating because they are different from the ones we usually look at when we are at the beach, or on a boat: they do not move along the surface of the ocean but they follow complicated trajectories in the interior of the liquid, that is why they are called “internal waves”.
Well, since they are hidden in the interior of the ocean, is very difficult to see and study them, however it is very important if we want to understand how much they influence the main ocean currents, and, eventually, the whole climate on Earth.

During my study, I am using real data of current speed, temperature and salinity, measured in the deep equatorial Atlantic ocean, to see which is the role of these internal waves in the ocean at the Equator, since currents are quite strong there, and nobody knows exactly why. Are the internal waves responsible?
Give me some time, I am trying to figure this out…
While not using (or taking) real data from the sea, I am also trying to describe these internal waves using simple, mathematical models, or I am playing in our laboratory, where with water and salt we re-create our little ocean.

Most of my working days are spent at my Institute, the NIOZ. This can seem quite boring, but what you probably do not know is that this institute is on a tiny island in the North Sea, that means a lot of rains, but especially a lot of wind! Getting to the office, walking or cycling, can be quite adventurous, as a day start…

When I am at the office I usually study theoretical aspects of my research, on old books or on recent published findings and discuss them with my colleagues and supervisors. Then I write about it, or program some code to test our ideas with simple mathematical models or with real data that we have collected in the ocean. In between, there are a lot of coffee breaks and chats with my fellow colleagues, of course!

Some days I also work in our lab, where we try to understand waves directly looking at them without having to go 4 km down inside the ocean, but the best days in my view are the ones in which we actually go at sea, put instruments in the water and try to understand how the ocean works.

A typical day during a research cruise does not exist: you can sail in March, in the North Sea, and be on duty in the first shift (way before dawn) and therefore you will just see a lot of snow falling on the dark sea, and a weak Sun coming up in between oil platforms, while you are taking your measurements, or you can sail in the Mediterranean Sea, between Malta and Greece, and be on duty in the daily shift.
And of course weather and sea conditions can change your day very rapidly!

At sea, as a physical oceanographer, we usually measure current velocities, temperature and salinity of the water or the amount of sediments present in the water.However, research cruises often combines teams from different fields like marine biologists, marine geologists, or ecologists. In fact, when I have time, I like to help and see what the “others” are doing: there is always something new to learn.

Research cruises are not just fun, of course, they are also very demanding: one of the main reason is that they are extremely expansive. This means that when we go at sea we have to know exactly what we want to measure, and how, and why, since data are really precious, and they are paid by the citizens through their taxes. Doing good science every day is also a form of respect to society.