The PIANO project aims to conduct innovative technological developments on Argo floats and sensors and to secure the implementation of the French contribution to the new Argo phase, in coherence with other structuring projects such as REFINE (ERC) and Argo-2030 (PIA3 EQUIPEX). PIANO will allow to purchase BGC-Argo floats, continue the development of the NOSS density sensor, expand the BGC sensor offer, reach greater depths with the Deep-6000 Argo float, improve float hardware, and finally improve the processing of Argo data. The contribution of LOV will be mainly oriented onto the deployment and processing of BGC-Argo data and the management of the work package dedicated to the development of new sensors dedicated to the BGC-Argo network. In particular, LOV will work on a new sensor to measure chlorophyll fluorescence and, in collaboration with the Centre d’Etude Biologique de Chizé, the adaptation to BGC-Argo of an acoustic micro-sonar to measure large particle size and concentration.
