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They bob on the surface of the ocean, scanning everything around them. Then they sink into the depths, only to rise back to the top a few days later. What are these strange creatures, and what do they have to do with the weather? Technically, they're calling profiling floats, but reporters like to refer to them as oceanic robots.

Hi, I'm Bryan Yeaton for the Weather Notebook.

Right now about 300 of these robotic cylinders are drifting across the ocean. In just a few years there will be ten times that number. The idea is to measure the ocean--its temperature, salt content, and flow patterns--just as we now measure the atmosphere through weather balloons.

Each of these bright yellow, battery-operated robots stands about chest-high. They sink to a depth of more than 6000 feet, then stay there for about 10 days. At that point they quickly rise to the surface and send their data via satellite to a central processing facility. Then the robots are ready for another 10-day dive.

How might this affect your weather and climate outlook? Computer models should be able to perform more accurately when they have better data on where ocean currents are going.

Right now we can warn people about a Niño or Niña once it's getting started, but advance forecasts are still difficult. That's partially because we have good undersea data for only a few small slices of the Pacific. Thanks to the new diving robots, we'll be able to monitor a much bigger chunk of the ocean. That should help us keep better tabs on El Niño and La Niña long before they give us any trouble.

Thanks today to writer Bob Henson of Boulder, Colorado. The Weather Notebook is a production of the Mount Washington Observatory. It is supported by the National Science Foundation and Subaru.