ALBERT

Description: A neural network is used to calculate the longwave net radiation (Lnet) at the sea surface from measurements of the Special Sensor Microwave/Imager (SSM/I). The neural network applied in this study is able to account largely for the nonlinearity between Lnet and the satellite-measured brightness temperatures (TB). The algorithm can be applied for instantaneous measurements over oceanic regions with the area extent of satellite passive microwave observations (30–60 km in diameter). Comparing with a linear regression method the neural network reduces the standard error for Lnet from 17 to 5 W m−2 when applied to model results. For clear-sky cases, a good agreement with an error of less than 5 W m−2 for Lnet between calculations from SSM/I observations and pyrgeometer measurements on the German research vessel Poseidon during the International Cirrus Experiment (ICE) 1989 is obtained. For cloudy cases, the comparison is problematic due to the inhomogenities of clouds and the low and different spatial resolutions of the SSM/I data. Global monthly mean values of Lnet for October 1989 are computed and compared to other sources. Differences are observed among the climatological values from previous studies by H.-J. Isemer and L. Hasse, the climatological values from R. Lindau and L. Hasse, the values of W. L. Darnell et al., and results from this study. Some structures of Lnet are similar for results from W. L. Darnell et al. and the present authors. The differences between both results are generally less than 15 W m−2. Over the North Atlantic Ocean the authors found a poleward increase for Lnet, which is contrary to the results of H.-J. Isemer and L. Hasse.

Description: Parameterization of turbulent wind stress and sensible and latent heat fluxes is reviewed in the context of climate studies and model calculations, and specific formulas based on local measurements are recommended. Wind speed is of key importance, and in applying experimental results, the differences between local and modeled winds must be considered in terms of their method of observation or calculation. Climatological wind data based on Beaufort wind force reports require correction for historical trends. Integrated long-term net turbulent and radiative heat fluxes at the sea surface, calculated from archived data, are consistent with meridional heat transport through oceanographic sections; this lends support to the methods used

Description: Data from almost five years of current meter moorings located across the Bahamas Escarpment at 26.5 degrees N are used to investigate meridional heat transport variability in the section and its impact on transatlantic heat Aux. Estimates of heat transport derived from the moored arrays are compared to results from the Community Modeling Effort (CME) Atlantic basin model and to historical hydrographic section data. A large fraction of the entire transatlantic heat flux is observed in this western boundary region, due to the opposing warm and cold water flows associated with the Antilles Current in the thermocline and the deep western boundary current at depth. Local heat transport time series derived from the moored arrays exhibit large variability over a range of +/- 2 PW relative to 0 degrees C, on timescales of roughly 100 days. An annual cycle of local heat transport with a range of 1.4 PW is observed with a summer maximum and fall minimum, qualitatively similar to CME model results. Breakdown of the total heat transport into conventional ''barotropic'' (depth averaged) and ''baroclinic'' (transport independent) components indicates an approximately equal contribution from both components. The annual mean value of the baroclinic hear transport in the western boundary layer is 0.53 +/- 0.08 PW northward, of opposite direction and more than half the magnitude of the total southward baroclinic heat transport between Africa and the Bahamas (about -0.8 PW) derived from transatlantic sections. Combination of the results from the moored arrays with Levitus climatology in the interior and historical Florida Current data yields an estimate of 1.44 +/- 0.33 PW for the annual mean transatlantic heat Aux at 26.5 degrees N, approximately 0.2 PW greater than the previously accepted value of 1.2-1.3 PW at this latitude.

Description: The relative importance of the formation of different North Atlantic Deep Water masses on the meridional overturning is examined with a non-eddy-resolving version of the CME model. In contrast to a frequently held belief, convective deep-water formation south of the North Atlantic sill does not significantly force the large-scale overturning if an adequate overflow across the sill can be represented by the model. The sensitivity of the meridional transport to the surface thermohaline forcing is increased under alternate climatic conditions such as increased surface cooling or reduced overflow compared to the present-day situation. The results indicate that climate models may be too sensitive to decadal timescale variability of the surface forcing in subpolar regions.

Description: The dominant variability modes in the Tropics are investigated and contrasted with the anomalous situation observed during the last few years. The prime quantity analyzed is anomalous sea surface temperature (SST) in the region 30°S–60°N. Additionally, observed tropical surface wind stress fields were investigated. Further tropical atmospheric information was derived from a multidecadal run with an atmospheric general circulation model that was forced by the same SSTs. The tropical SST variability can be characterized by three modes: an interannual mode [the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO)], a decadal mode, and a trend or unresolved ultra-low-frequency variability. The dominant mode of SST variability is the ENSO mode. It is strongest in the eastern equatorial Pacific, but influences also the SSTs in other regions through atmospheric teleconnections, such as the Indian and North Pacific Oceans. The ENSO mode was strong during the 1980s, but it existed with very weak amplitude and short period after 1991. The second most energetic mode is characterized by considerable decadal variability. This decadal mode is connected with SST anomalies of the same sign in all three tropical oceans. The tropical Pacific signature of the decadal mode resembles closely that observed during the last few years and can be characterized by a horseshoe pattern, with strongest SST anomalies in the western equatorial Pacific, extending to the northeast and southeast into the subtropics. It is distinct from the ENSO mode, since it is not connected with any significant SST anomalies in the eastern equatorial Pacific, which is the ENSO key region. However, the impact of the decadal mode on the tropical climate resembles in many respects that of ENSO. In particular, the decadal mode is strongly linked to decadal rainfall fluctuations over northeastern Australia in the observations. It is shown that the anomalous 1990s were dominated by the decadal mode. Considerable SST variability can be attributed also to a linear trend or unresolved ultra-low-frequency variability. This trend that might be related to greenhouse warming is rather strong and positive in the Indian Ocean and western equatorial Pacific where it accounts for up to 30% of the total SST variability. Consistent with the increase of SST in the warm pool region, the trends over the tropical Pacific derived from both the observations and the model indicate a strengthening of the trade winds. This is inconsistent with the conditions observed during the 1990s. If the wind trends reflect greenhouse warming, it must be concluded that the anomalous 1990s are not caused by greenhouse warming. Finally, hybrid coupled ocean–atmosphere model experiments were conducted in order to investigate the sensistivity of ENSO to the low-frequency changes induced by the decadal mode and the trend. The results indicate that ENSO is rather sensitive to these changes in the background conditions.

Description: The El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon is modeled as a stochastically driven dynamical system. This was accomplished by adding to a Hybrid Coupled Model (HCM) of the tropical Pacific ocean–atmosphere system a stochastic wind stress anomaly field that was derived from observations. The model exhibits irregular interannual fluctuations, whose space–time characteristics resemble those of the observed interannual climate variability in this region. To investigate the predictability of the model, the authors performed ensemble integrations with different realizations of the stochastic wind stress forcing. The ensembles were initialized at various phases of the model’s ENSO cycle simulated in a 120-yr integration with a particular noise realization. The numerical experiments indicate that the ENSO predictability is severely limited by the stochastic wind stress forcing. Linear stochastic processes were fitted to the restart ensembles in a reduced state space. A predictability measure based on a comparison of the stationary and the time-dependent probability distributions of the fitted linear models reveals an ENSO predictability limit of considerably less than an average cycle length.

Description: Parametric representations of oceanic geostrophic eddy transfer of heat and salt are studied ranging fromhorizontal diffusion to the more physically based approaches of Green and Stone (GS) and Gent and McWilliams(GM). The authors argue for a representation that combines the best aspects of GS and GM: transfer coefficientsthat vary in space and time in a manner that depends on the large-scale density fields (GS) and adoption of atransformed Eulerian mean formalism (GM). Recommendations are based upon a two-dimensional (zonally orazimuthally averaged) model with parameterized horizontal and vertical fluxes that is compared to three-dimensional numerical calculations in which the eddy transfer is resolved. Three different scenarios are considered: 1) a convective “chimney” where the baroclinic zone is created by differential surface cooling; 2) spindownof a frontal zone due to baroclinic eddies; and 3) a wind-driven, baroclinically unstable channel. Guided bybaroclinic instability theory and calibrated against eddy-resolving calculations, the authors recommend a formfor the horizontal transfer coefficient given by where Ri = f2N2/M4 is the large-scale Richardson number and f is the Coriolis parameter; M2 and N2 are measuresof the horizontal and vertical stratification of the large-scale flow, l measures the width of the baroclinic zone,and α is a constant of proportionality. In the very different scenarios studied here the authors find α to be a“universal” constant equal to 0.015, not dissimilar to that found by Green for geostrophic eddies in the atmosphere. The magnitude of the implied k, however, varies from 300 m2 s−1 in the chimney to 2000 m2 s−1 inthe wind-driven channel.

Description: A review is given of the meaning of the term “El Niño” and how it has changed in time, so there is no universal single definition. This needs to be recognized for scientific uses, and precision can only be achieved if the particular definition is identified in each use to reduce the possibility of misunderstanding. For quantitative purposes, possible definitions are explored that match the El Niños identified historically after 1950, and it is suggested that an El Niño can be said to occur if 5-month running means of sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies in the Niño 3.4 region (5°N–5°S, 120°–170°W) exceed 0.4°C for 6 months or more. With this definition, El Niños occur 31% of the time and La Niñas (with an equivalent definition) occur 23% of the time. The histogram of Niño 3.4 SST anomalies reveals a bimodal character. An advantage of such a definition is that it allows the beginning, end, duration, and magnitude of each event to be quantified. Most El Niños begin in the northern spring or perhaps summer and peak from November to January in sea surface temperatures.

Description: A new numerical two-layer model is presented, which describes the generation of internal tidal bores and their disintegration into internal solitary waves in the Strait of Messina. This model is used to explain observations made by the synthetic aperture radar (SAR) from the European Remote Sensing satellites ERS 1 and ERS 2. The analysis of available ERS 1/2 SAR data of the Strait of Messina and adjacent sea areas show that 1) northward as well as southward propagating internal waves are generated in the Strait of Messina, 2) southward propagating internal waves are observed more frequently than northward propagating internal waves, 3) sea surface manifestations of southward as well as northward propagating internal waves are stronger during periods where a strong seasonal thermocline is known to be present, 4) southward propagating internal bores are released from the sill between 1 and 5 hours after maximum northward tidal flow and northward propagating internal bores are released between 2 and 6 hours after maximum southward tidal flow, and 5) the spatial separation between the first two internal solitary waves of southward propagating wave trains is smaller in the period from July to September than in the period from October to June. The numerical two-layer model is a composite of two models consisting of 1) a hydrostatic “generation model,” which describes the dynamics of the water masses in the region close to the strait’s sill, where internal bores are generated, and 2) a weakly nonhydrostatic “propagation model,” which describes the dynamics of the water masses outside of the sill region where internal bores may disintegrate into internal solitary waves. Due to a technique for movable lateral boundaries, the generation model is capable of simulating the dynamics of a lower layer that may intersect the bottom topography. The proposed generation–propagation model depends on one space variable only, but it retains several features of a fully three-dimensional model by including a realistic channel depth and a realistic channel width. It is driven by semidiurnal tidal oscillations of the sea level at the two open boundaries of the model domain. Numerical simulations elucidate several observed characteristics of the internal wave field in the Strait of Messina, such as north–south asymmetry, times of release of the internal bores from the strait’s sill, propagation speeds, and spatial separations between the first two solitary waves of internal wave trains.

Description: Long-term interannual variations of the intramonthly standard deviations of surface meteorological parameters are studied on the basis of the North Atlantic Ocean Weather Stations (OWSs) dataset. To consider the different scales of short-term synoptic variability, intramonthly statistics were calculated for 3-h sampled data and for running-mean data as well. Year-to-year variability is considered in terms of linear trends and interannual oscillations with characteristic periods of several years. Intramonthly standard deviations for most of the parameters tended to decrease during the OWS observational period. Trends in the parameters for different synoptic-scale statistics are discussed. Intramonthly statistics, computed for different averaging scales, demonstrate remarkably different short-period year to year oscillations. Some relationships between the interannual variations of synoptic activity and the SST anomalies are presented. Intramonthly statistics are found to be an effective indicator of the North Atlantic Oscillation. Finally, the possibility of applying results to statistics computed from climatological datasets and analyses of meteorological centers is discussed.

Description: Differences between “classical” and “sampling” estimates of mean climatological heat fluxes and their seasonal and interannual variability are considered on the basis of individual marine observations from the Comprehensive Ocean–Atmosphere Data Set. Calculations of fluxes were done for intramonthly averaging and for 1°–5° spatial averaging. Sampling estimates give in general 10% to 60% higher values of fluxes than do classical estimates. Spatial averaging has a larger effect than temporal averaging in the Tropics and subtropics, and temporal averaging is more effective than spatial averaging in midlatitudes. The largest absolute differences between sampling and classical estimates of fluxes are observed in middle latitudes, where they are 15 to 20 W m−2 for sensible heat flux and 50 to 70 W m−2 for latent heat flux. Differences between sampling and classical estimates can change the annual cycle of sea–air fluxes. There is a secular tendency of increasing “sampling- to-classical” ratios of 1% to 5% decade−1 over the North Atlantic. Relationships between sampling-to-classical ratios and parameters of the sea–air interface, the number of observations, and the spatial arrangement of samples are considered. Climatologically significant differences between sampling and classical estimates are analyzed in terms of the contribution from different covariances between individual variables. The influence of different parameterizations of the transfer coefficients on sampling minus classical differences is considered. Parameterizations that indicate growing transfer coefficients with wind speed give the larger sampling minus classical differences in comparison with those based on either constant or decreasing with wind coefficients. Nevertheless, over the North Atlantic midlatitudes, all parameterizations indicate significant sampling minus classical differences of about several tens of watts per square meter. The importance of differences between sampling and classical estimates for the evaluation of meridional heat transport shows that differences between sampling and classical estimates can lead to 0.5–1-PW differences in meridional heat transport estimates.

Description: Ocean currents’ effect on long-range sound propagation, though considerable in many cases, is difficult to separate from much stronger effects due to sound speed inhomogeneities, as flow velocity is usually much smaller than typical variations in the sound speed. Dramatic improvement can be achieved in reciprocal transmission experiments when sound signals propagate in opposite directions between two transceivers (source–receiver pairs). The presence of a current results in the breaking of the principle of acoustic reciprocity, thus making it possible to use nonreciprocity of acoustic field as an indicator of water movement. In this paper, reciprocal acoustic transmissions through a submesoscale interthermocline lens of Mediterranean Water (meddy) in the Atlantic are considered theoretically as a possible tool for meddies detection. A simple model of acoustic ray-travel-time nonreciprocity due to a meddy is proposed. The analytic estimates obtained from the model show that the influence of rotary flow is more important than that of drift and seems to be measurable. The problem is studied in more detail via computer simulations. The environmental model used in the simulations corresponds to case studies performed in the Iberian Basin in 1989 and 1991. Numerical simulations show that travel times between two transceivers can be gathered into several groups; for the most part, rays in each set have similar geometry for both propagation directions. However, the lens strongly affects the number of rays in each group, their launch angles, and number of surface interactions, making it impossible to identify these arrivals as required for conventional ocean acoustic tomography. In spite of complexity of ray structure, travel-time nonreciprocity predicted by the model proposed is in good agreement with numerical results. This fact suggests that the model could be used to estimate some parameters of a meddy.