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Turbulent mixing in the ocean, lakes and reservoirs facilitates the transport of momentum, heat, nutrients, and other passive tracers. Turbulent fluxes are proportional to the rate of turbulent kinetic energy dissipation per unit mass,ε. A common method forεmeasurements is using microstructure profilers with shear probes. Such measurements are now widespread, and a non-expert practitioner will benefit from best practice guidelines and benchmark datasets. As a part of the Scientific Committee on Oceanographic Research (SCOR) working group on “Analysing ocean turbulence observations to quantify mixing” (ATOMIX), we compiled a collection of five benchmark data ofεfrom measurements of turbulence shear using shear probes. The datasets are processed using the ATOMIX recommendations for best practices documented separately. Here, we describe and validate the datasets. The benchmark collection is from different types of instruments and covers a wide range of environmental conditions. These datasets serve to guide the users to test theirεestimation methods and quality-assurance metrics, and to standardize their data for archiving.

Small-scale turbulent mixing drives the upwelling of deep water masses in the abyssal ocean as part of the global overturning circulation¹. However, the processes leading to mixing and the pathways through which this upwelling occurs remain insufficiently understood. Recent observational and theoretical work^2–5has suggested that deep-water upwelling may occur along the ocean’s sloping seafloor; however, evidence has, so far, been indirect. Here we show vigorous near-bottom upwelling across isopycnals at a rate of the order of 100 metres per day, coupled with adiabatic exchange of near-boundary and interior fluid. These observations were made using a dye released close to the seafloor within a sloping submarine canyon, and they provide direct evidence of strong, bottom-focused diapycnal upwelling in the deep ocean. This supports previous suggestions that mixing at topographic features, such as canyons, leads to globally significant upwelling^3,6–8. The upwelling rates observed were approximately 10,000 times higher than the global average value required for approximately 30 × 10⁶m³s⁻¹of net upwelling globally⁹.