© Flickr user Dave StokesA small whirlpool.
Rotating masses of water called eddies are common in the ocean. The newly revealed pairs, however, churn through the water up to ten times faster than their single counterparts, and are connected underwater by a U-shaped vortex. What's more, they might be able to slurp up tiny marine animals and
ferry them great distances. Researchers are now trying to figure out how these maelstroms came to be and why they behave so weirdly.
Eddies, which can measure more than 60 miles across, are typically created by turbulence in larger ocean currents. "When they reach a certain strength they spontaneously start meandering and breaking up into eddies," says Chris Hughes, an oceanographer at University of Liverpool in England and one of the scientists behind the new discovery. Eddies play an important role in the ocean by mixing water from different areas, he says. They can stir up nutrients
normally found in deeper waters and transport water across gyres, patterns of circular ocean currents that can be thousands of miles wide. This is essential for transporting heat from the equator up to the waters around the poles. "That really wouldn't be possible without the eddies," Hughes says.
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