About me

Email: marcel.du.plessis@gu.se
Open source code
University Profile

Department of Marine Sciences
University of Gothenburg
Office 3234 | Carl Skottsbergs gata 22B
Gothenburg, Sweden

Hi, I’m a Research Fellow in the Polar Gliders research group at the Marine Sciences Department at the University of Gothenburg. I study the effects of mid-latitude cyclones and ocean eddies on the air-sea exchange of heat and carbon dioxide in the Southern Ocean.

Projects I’m currently involved in are: Southern Ocean including Submesoscale Processes In a Changing Environment (SPICE), Robotic Observations and Modelling of the Marginal Ice Zone (ROAM-MIZ), and the Southern Ocean Carbon and Heat Impact on Climate (SO-CHIC). This December I will be involved in the SO-CHIC field campaign deploying ocean gliders in the Weddell Sea.

Keywords: mixed layer dynamics; upper ocean and submesoscale processes; air-sea heat, freshwater & carbon fluxes; autonomous ocean robotics; sea ice processes; idealized numerical modeling.

News
  • Oct 2021: Taught the fieldwork component of GU Masters course “From ideas to action“
  • Sep 2021: Swedish Polar Research Secreteriat news piece about my upcoming Antarctic fieldwork.
  • Sep 2021: Masters student Sean Evans (University of Cape Town) successfully passed his dissertation titled “The influence of oceanographic variability on the top predators of the Sub-Antarctic domain“.
  • July 2021: New publication in Stammerjohn et al. (2021) in Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society on “State of the Climate 2020“
Current positions and associations
  • Marie SkÅ‚odowska-Curie Research Fellow at the University of Gothenburg (2021-present)
  • Executive Committee of the SOOS Southern Ocean Flux Working Group (2019-present)
  • Member of the Observing Air-Sea Observations Strategy (OASIS, 2021-present)
  • Association for Polar Early Career Scientists South Africa National Committee (2019-present)
Current students
  • David Hagman, GU Masters student (2020-present)
  • Bongie Jojo, UCT Masters student (2020-present)
  • Gianlucca Gerich, GU Masters student (2021-present)
  • Hanna Rosenthal, GU PhD student (2021-present)
  • Theo Spira, GU PhD student (2021-present)
Fieldwork Photography

I’m fortunate to have unique fieldwork experiences and so I try and capture these moments in my photos.

My cabin port hole washing machine.
Jen Butler taking a walk in Antarctica.
S.A. Agulhas II in Antarctica.
Seaglider 640 “Semla” before deployment in Antarctica. Pic by Louise Biddle.
Antarctic iceberg taken on my first voyage to the continent in 2013.
Sailbuoy surface vehicle measures surface ocean and atmospheric variables.