Introduction

The Gulf of Mexico, the ninth-largest body of water in the world is a partially landlocked ocean basin that is surrounded by the US states of Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas on the north, Mexico on the south and southwest, and the island of Cuba on the southeast. The basin, which contains a volume of roughly 660 quadrillion gallons of water, features nutri­ent-enriched water from the deep through a process known as upwelling-a process where divergent ocean currents drive denser, cooler, nutrient-rich water towards the ocean surface, replacing the usually nutrient-depleted surface water. This stimulates plankton growth which attracts fish, shrimp, and squid. The gulf supplies 72% of U.S. harvested shrimp, 66% of harvested oysters, and 16% of commercial fish. 

However, amidst this large body of water, is an area known as the Gulf of Mexico Dead Zone. The zone, ranging anywhere from 6,500-7,800 square miles, occurs between the inner and mid-continental shelf in the northern Gulf of Mexico, beginning at the Mississippi River delta and extending westward to the upper Texas coast. This zone is considered “dead” because it is hypoxic (low-oxygen; less than 2 ppm dissolved O₂) and cannot support marine life. The main cause of the hypoxic zone is due to agricultural fertilizer run-off from the farming states that end up in the Mississippi River and eventually drain into the Gulf of Mexico via the Mississippi River Delta.