Profiling Instrument for Analysis of Key Redox Species, pH & Temperature

There currently is no commercially available instrument which can be programmed and used in real time to analyze a variety of electroactive species in the marine environment and simultaneously record pH and temperature. The development of a deployable / profiling electrochemical platform would allow for the real time measurement of electroactive species, pH and temperature in the water column, sediments and soils. Further, the instrument can be moored in position to take timed data, and used in the analysis of sediments in the ocean, bays, harbors (Tengberg, 1995), or planet surfaces. With the concern about Hot Spots, where both copper, tin, lead paints from ships and lead from discarded batteries from lighted buoys is a concern, an instrument such as this could be used to locate contaminated sediments in bays and harbors. A moored electrochemical instrument can also be used to monitor discharge compliance from manufacturing, electrical power plants (for detecting copper or other metal contamination), in monitoring the effluent from hydrothermal vents (Nuzzio, 1988,1999) or used as a lander on a planetary surface.