Dr Jonathan Sharples

Head of Shelf Sea Processes

Leader of POL Programme 2 and POL's contribution to Oceans2025 Theme 3 (Shelf and Coastal Processes).

Current projects

Physics and Primary Production in the Shelf Sea Seasonal Thermocline (NERC non-thematic project). Collaborating with colleagues at the National Oceanography Centre (Southampton) and the University of Wales (Bangor) on an investigation of mixing processes, nutrient and carbon fluxes, and primary production in the subsurface chlorophyll maximum.

Horizontal Patchiness in Vertical Mixing (Oceans2025 NERC core science) Collaborating with colleagues at the Scottish Association for Marine Science and at Aberdeen University) on assessing the physics and biological impacts of patchy mixing, driven by variations in seabed bathymetry and in surface meteorological forcing, including the consequences for marine bioresources.

Research interests

Cross-disciplinary processes in shelf seas: Turbulent mixing and the vertical fluxes of nutrients and algal carbon, the influence of turbulence on phytoplankton photo-acclimation and primary production.
Estuarine processes: Tides, turbulence and residual transport in estuaries.
Shelf edge exchange processes: internal tide, mixing, nutrient fluxes, and shelf edge productivity.

Publications

Sharples , J., J. F. Tweddle, J. A. M. Green, M. R. Palmer, Y. -N. Kim, A. E. Hickman, P. M. Holligan, C. M. Moore, T. P. Rippeth, J. H. Simpson, and V. Krivtsov. 2007. Spring-neap modulation of internal tide mixing and vertical nitrate fluxes at a shelf edge in summer. Limnology & Oceanography, 52(5),1735-1747.

Huisman, J., J. Sharples, J. Stroom, P. M. Visser, W. E. A. Kardinaal, J. M. H. Verspagen, and B. Sommeijer. 2004. Changes in turbulent mixing shift competition for light between phytoplankton species. Ecology, 85, 2960-2970.

Sharples, J. and P. Tett. 1994. Modelling observations of the seasonal cycle of primary productivity: the importance of short-term physical variability. Journal of Marine Research 52, 219-238.

Sharples, J., C. M. Moore, T. P. Rippeth, P. M. Holligan, D. J. Hydes, N. R. Fisher, & J. H. Simpson. 2001. Phytoplankton distribution and survival in the thermocline. Limnology and Oceanography, 46(3), 486-496.

Sharples, J., C. M. Moore, E. R. Abraham. 2001. Internal tide dissipation, mixing, and vertical nitrate flux at the shelf edge of NE New Zealand. Journal of Geophysical Research, 106 (C7), 14,069-14,081.

Ross, O. N., & J. Sharples. 2004. Recipe for 1-D lagrangian particle-tracking models in space-varying diffusivity. Limnology & Oceanography Methods, 2, 289-302.

Sharples, J., O. N. Ross, B. E. Scott, S. P. R. Greenstreet, and H. Fraser, 2006. Inter-annual variability in the timing of stratification and the spring bloom in the North-western North Sea. Continental Shelf Research, 26, 733-751.

-->