Publication Date:
2022-05-25
Description:
Author Posting. © American Meteorological Society, 2008. This article is posted here by permission of American Meteorological Society for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Journal of Physical Oceanography 38 (2008): 133–145, doi:10.1175/2007JPO3782.1.
Description:
Five ice-tethered profilers (ITPs), deployed between 2004 and 2006, have provided detailed potential temperature θ and salinity S profiles from 21 anticyclonic eddy encounters in the central Canada Basin of the Arctic Ocean. The 12–35-m-thick eddies have center depths between 42 and 69 m in the Arctic halocline, and are shallower and less dense than the majority of eddies observed previously in the central Canada Basin. They are characterized by anomalously cold θ and low stratification, and have horizontal scales on the order of, or less than, the Rossby radius of deformation (about 10 km). Maximum azimuthal speeds estimated from dynamic heights (assuming cyclogeostrophic balance) are between 9 and 26 cm s−1, an order of magnitude larger than typical ambient flow speeds in the central basin. Eddy θ–S and potential vorticity properties, as well as horizontal and vertical scales, are consistent with their formation by instability of a surface front at about 80°N that appears in historical CTD and expendable CTD (XCTD) measurements. This would suggest eddy lifetimes longer than 6 months. While the baroclinic instability of boundary currents cannot be ruled out as a generation mechanism, it is less likely since deeper eddies that would originate from the deeper-reaching boundary flows are not observed in the survey region.
Description:
The engineering design work for
the ITP was initiated by the Cecil H. and Ida M. Green
Technology Innovation Program (an internal program
at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution). Prototype
development and construction were funded jointly
by the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF)
Oceanographic Technology and Interdisciplinary Coordination
Program and Office of Polar Programs (OPP)
under Award OCE-0324233. Continued support has
been provided by the OPP Arctic Sciences Section under
Award ARC-0519899 and internal WHOI funding.
Keywords:
Arctic
;
Eddies
;
Profilers
;
Stability
;
Salinity
Repository Name:
Woods Hole Open Access Server
Type:
Article
Format:
application/pdf
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