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  • Articles  (1,025)
  • 2015-2019  (1,025)
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  • Articles  (1,025)
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  • 1
    Publication Date: 2019-12-27
    Description: The spatial distribution and seasonality of halocline structures in the subarctic North Pacific (SNP) were investigated using Argo profiling float data and various surface flux data collected in 2003–17. The permanent halocline (PH) showed zonal patterns in the spatial distributions of its depth and intensity and tended to be shallow and strong in the eastern SNP but deep and weak in the west. Mean distributions of PH depth and intensity corresponded to the winter mixed layer depth and sea surface salinity, respectively, indicating that it forms in association with the development of the winter mixed layer. In the Western Subarctic Gyre and Alaskan Gyre, where a relatively strong PH formed, PH intensity and depth showed clear seasonal variations, and deepening of the mixed layer compressed the underlying PH during the cooling period, resulting in intensification and development of the PH in late winter. In both regions, upwelling of high-salinity water also contributed to PH intensification. The summer seasonal halocline (SH) showed distinct zonal differences in frequency and intensity, which were opposite to the PH distribution. While an SH formed in the western and central SNP and coastal regions, it was seldom present in the eastern area. This zonal contrast of SH corresponded to freshening of the mixed layer during the warming period, primarily reflecting freshwater flux. Geostrophic and Ekman advection play important roles in spatial differences in SH intensity and depth. SH development contributed to PH intensification in the following winter, by decreasing salinity above the PH through entrainment.
    Print ISSN: 0022-3670
    Electronic ISSN: 1520-0485
    Topics: Geosciences , Physics
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  • 2
    Publication Date: 2019-12-27
    Description: A universal law of estuarine mixing is derived here, combining the approaches of salinity coordinates, Knudsen relations, total exchange flow, mixing definition as salinity variance loss, and the mixing–exchange flow relation. As a result, the long-term average mixing within an estuarine volume bounded by the isohaline of salinity S amounts to M(S) = S2Qr, where Qr is the average river runoff into the estuary. Consequently, the mixing per salinity class is m(S) = ∂SM(S) = 2SQr, which can also be expressed as the product of the isohaline volume and the mixing averaged over the isohaline. The major differences between the new mixing law and the recently developed mixing relation based on the Knudsen relations are threefold: (i) it does not depend on internal dynamics of the estuary determining inflow and outflow salinities (universality), (ii) it is exactly derived from conservation laws (accuracy), and (iii) it calculates mixing per salinity class (locality). The universal mixing law is demonstrated by means of analytical stationary and one-dimensional and two-dimensional numerical test cases. Some possible consequences for the salinity distribution in real estuaries are briefly discussed. Since the mixing per salinity class only depends on the river runoff and the chosen salinity, and not on local processes at the isohaline, low-mixing estuaries must have large isohaline volumes and vice versa.
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    Electronic ISSN: 1520-0485
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  • 3
    Publication Date: 2019-12-19
    Description: Reconstructability of upper-ocean vertical velocity w and vorticity ζ fields from high-resolution sea surface height (SSH) data is explored using the global 1/48° horizontal-resolution MITgcm output in the context of the forthcoming Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission. By decomposing w with an omega equation of the primitive equation system and by taking into account the measurement design of the SWOT mission, this study seeks to reconstruct the subinertial, balanced w and ζ signals. By adopting the effective surface quasigeostrophic (eSQG) framework and applying to the Kuroshio Extension region of the North Pacific, we find that the target and reconstructed fields have a spatial correlation of ~0.7 below the mixed layer for w and 0.7–0.9 throughout the 1000-m upper ocean for ζ in the error-free scenario. By taking the SWOT sampling and measurement errors into account, the spatial correlation is found to decrease to 0.4–0.6 below the mixed layer for w and 0.6–0.7 for ζ, respectively. For both w and ζ reconstruction, the degradation due to the SWOT errors is more significant in the surface layer and for smaller-scale signals. The impact of errors lessens with the increasing depth and lengthening horizontal scales.
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  • 4
    Publication Date: 2019-12-19
    Description: An inner-shelf (IS) dye plume that formed following a 3.84-h early morning surfzone (SZ) dye release off of Imperial Beach, California, is analyzed with in situ and aerial remotely sensed observations. Midmorning, 5 h after release start, the IS plume extended 800 m offshore (or ≈8Lsz, where Lsz is the surfzone width) and was surface intensified. Over the next ≈2 h, the IS plume deformed (narrowed) cross-shore with the offshore front progressing onshore at ≈5 cm s−1, deepened by up to 3 m, and elongated alongshore at ≈4.5 cm s−1 km−1 (at ≈2.5Lsz). Coincident with IS plume deformation and deepening, IS isotherms also deepened, with relatively stable IS plume joint dye and temperature statistics. Offshore tracer transport and subsequent IS plume deformation and deepening likely resulted from two phases of the diurnal internal tide (DIT). During and after deformation, the IS plume did not reenter the warm surfzone, which potentially acted as a thermal barrier. High-frequency internal waves (HF IWs) propagated through the IS plume at ≈9 cm s−1 and dissipated onshore of 4Lsz. Surface HF IW signal was elevated in the plume elongation region, suggesting a linkage between plume elongation and either the DIT or HF IW. This IS plume evolution differs from previous SZ tracer releases, highlighting the effects of release timing relative to the solar cycle or the internal tide.
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  • 5
    Publication Date: 2019-12-17
    Description: This study examines the utility of Eady-type theories as applied to understanding baroclinic instability in coastal flows where depth variations and bottom drag are important. The focus is on the effects of nongeostrophy, boundary dissipation, and bottom slope. The approach compares theoretically derived instability properties against numerical model calculations, for experiments designed to isolate the individual effects and justified to have Eady-like basic states. For the nongeostrophic effect, the theory of Stone (1966) is shown to give reasonable predictions for the most unstable growth rate and wavelength. It is also shown that the growing instability in a fully nonlinear model can be interpreted as boundary-trapped Rossby wave interactions—that is, wave phase locking and westward phase tilt allow waves to be mutually amplified. The analyses demonstrate that both the boundary dissipative and bottom slope effects can be represented by vertical velocities at the lower boundary of the unstable interior, via inducing Ekman pumping and slope-parallel flow, respectively, as proposed by the theories of Williams and Robinson (1974; referred to as the Eady–Ekman problem) and Blumsack and Gierasch (1972). The vertical velocities, characterized by a friction parameter and a slope ratio, modify the bottom wave and thus the scale selection. However, the theories have inherent quantitative limitations. Eady–Ekman neglects boundary layer responses that limit the increase of bottom stress, thereby overestimating the Ekman pumping and growth rate reduction at large drag. Blumsack and Gierasch’s (1972) model ignores slope-induced horizontal shear in the mean flow that tilts the eddies to favor converting energy back to the mean, thus having limited utility over steep slopes.
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  • 6
    Publication Date: 2019-12-01
    Description: The calculation of energy flux in coastal trapped wave modes is reviewed in the context of tidal energy pathways near the coast. The significant barotropic pressures and currents associated with coastal trapped wave modes mean that large errors in estimating the wave flux are incurred if only the baroclinic component is considered. A specific example is given showing that baroclinic flux constitutes only 10% of the flux in a mode-1 wave for a reasonable choice of stratification and bathymetry. The interpretation of baroclinic energy flux and barotropic-to-baroclinic conversion at the coast is discussed: in contrast to the open ocean, estimates of baroclinic energy flux do not represent a wave energy flux; neither does conversion represent the scattering of energy from the tidal Kelvin wave to higher modes.
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  • 7
    Publication Date: 2019-12-01
    Description: By parameterizing the abyssal mixing as the exchange velocity (entrainment/detrainment) between the middle and deep layers of the South China Sea (SCS), its effects on the multilayer circulation are examined. Results indicate that the cyclonic circulation in the deep SCS appears only when the mixing induces an entrainment of at least 0.72 Sv (1 Sv ≡ 106 m3 s−1) from the deep to the middle layer, which is equivalent to a diapycnal diffusivity of 0.65 × 10−3 m2 s−1 or a net input rate of gravitational potential energy (GPE) of 6.89 GW, respectively. It is also found that tidal mixing in the SCS is stronger than the threshold for the generation of the cyclonic abyssal circulation, but the pattern and evolution of the deep circulation and meridional overturning circulation also depend on the spatiotemporal variability of the mixing. Moreover, the abyssal mixing is able to intensify the anticyclonic circulation in the middle layer but weaken the cyclonic circulation in the upper layer. Vorticity analysis suggests that the upward net flux induced by the abyssal mixing leads to vortex stretching (squeezing) and modulates the pressure gradient by redistributing the layer thickness, hence affects the pattern and strength of the circulation in the middle (deep) layer of the SCS, respectively. The depth-integrated effect of the thickness variation can modulate the pressure gradient across all layers and hence influence the upper-layer circulation.
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  • 8
    Publication Date: 2019-12-01
    Description: This study utilizes a large-eddy simulation (LES) approach to systematically assess the directional variability of wave-driven Langmuir turbulence (LT) in the ocean surface boundary layer (OSBL) under tropical cyclones (TCs). The Stokes drift vector, which drives LT through the Craik–Leibovich vortex force, is obtained through spectral wave simulations. LT’s direction is identified by horizontally elongated turbulent structures and objectively determined from horizontal autocorrelations of vertical velocities. In spite of a TC’s complex forcing with great wind and wave misalignments, this study finds that LT is approximately aligned with the wind. This is because the Reynolds stress and the depth-averaged Lagrangian shear (Eulerian plus Stokes drift shear) that are key in determining the LT intensity (determined by normalized depth-averaged vertical velocity variances) and direction are also approximately aligned with the wind relatively close to the surface. A scaling analysis of the momentum budget suggests that the Reynolds stress is approximately constant over a near-surface layer with predominant production of turbulent kinetic energy by Stokes drift shear, which is confirmed from the LES results. In this layer, Stokes drift shear, which dominates the Lagrangian shear, is aligned with the wind because of relatively short, wind-driven waves. On the contrary, Stokes drift exhibits considerable amount of misalignments with the wind. This wind–wave misalignment reduces LT intensity, consistent with a simple turbulent kinetic energy model. Our analysis shows that both the Reynolds stress and LT are aligned with the wind for different reasons: the former is dictated by the momentum budget, while the latter is controlled by wind-forced waves.
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  • 9
    Publication Date: 2019-12-01
    Description: Here, we examine baroclinic instability in the presence of vertical mixing in an idealized setting. Specifically, we use a simple model for vertical mixing of momentum and buoyancy and expand the buoyancy and vorticity in a series for small Rossby numbers. A flow in subinertial mixed layer (SML) balance (see the study by Young in 1994) exhibits a normal mode linear instability, which is studied here using linear stability analysis and numerical simulations. The most unstable modes grow by converting potential energy associated with the basic state into kinetic energy of the growing perturbations. However, unlike the inviscid Eady problem, the dominant energy balance is between the buoyancy flux and the energy dissipated by vertical mixing. Vertical mixing reduces the growth rate and changes the orientation of the most unstable modes with respect to the front. By comparing with numerical simulations, we find that the predicted scale of the most unstable mode matches the simulations for small Rossby numbers while the growth rate and orientation agree for a broader range of parameters. A stability analysis of a basic state in SML balance using the inviscid QG equations shows that the angle of the unstable modes is controlled by the orientation of the SML flow, while stratification associated with an advection/diffusion balance controls the size of growing perturbations for small Ekman numbers and/or large Rossby numbers. These results imply that baroclinic instability can be inhibited by small-scale turbulence when the Ekman number is sufficiently large and might explain the lack of submesoscale eddies in observations and numerical models of the ocean surface mixed layer during summer.
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  • 10
    Publication Date: 2019-12-01
    Description: When evaluated against the 1/30°-resolution, submesoscale-resolving OFES model outputs, the previously published “interior + surface quasigeostrophic” method (from the 2013 study by Wang et al., denoted W13) for reconstructing the ocean interior from sea surface information is found to perform improperly in depicting smaller-scale oceanic motions (associated with horizontal scales smaller than about 150 km). This could be attributed to the fact that the W13 method uses only the barotropic and first baroclinic modes for the downward projection of sea surface height (SSH), while SSH at smaller scales significantly reflects other higher-order modes. To overcome this limitation of W13, an extended method (denoted L19) is proposed by employing a scale-dependent vertical projection of SSH. Specifically, the L19 method makes the projection via two gravest modes as proposed in the W13 method only for larger-scale (〉150 km) signals, but for smaller scales (≤150 km) it exploits the framework of the “effective” surface quasigeostrophic (eSQG) method. Evaluation of the W13, eSQG, and L19 methods shows that the proposed L19 method can achieve the most satisfactory subsurface reconstruction in terms of both the flow and density fields in the upper 1000 m. Our encouraging results highlight the potential applicability of L19 method to the high-resolution SSH data from the upcoming Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) satellite mission.
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