Large scale inhomogeneities and mesoscale ocean waves: A single, stable wave field

Horizontally propagating wave solution forms are assumed for mid-ocean mesoscale currents (i.e., those with spatial and temporal cycles of a few hundred kilometers and several months). The wave environment-defined to include the Coriolis parameter, bottom topography, and mean currents-is assumed to be inhomogeneous, but only on much larger scales. Mutual compatibility between these assumptions is derived...

On the mean dynamical balances of the Gulf Stream Recirculation Zone

The time mean circulation is analyzed at a site on the southern edge of the Gulf Stream Recirculation Zone (31N, 70W) from data taken in the POLYMODE Local Dynamics Experiment. Additional mean quantities are described from a combination of dynamical assertions and inferences. The mean vorticity balance is examined to infer the mean vertical velocity and eddy relative vorticity flux divergence. The vertical velocity is found to be mostly upward and an order of magnitude larger than the downward surface Ekman pumping. In the mean heat, salt, density, and potential vorticity budgets, the mean advections of these quantities are nonzero, and substantial eddy flux divergences are again required for balance. These are inferred to be primarily associated with mesoscale eddies. The corresponding horizontal eddy diffusivities for these quantities are large (≈108 cm2 s−1 over an extensive depth range, from the surface to at least 4000 m. An assessment is also made of the likelihood of a homogeneous potential vorticity layer in the Recirculation Zone. From our estimates of the local potential vorticity gradients, there is no clearly indicated zero gradient layer, and the qualitative features of our local estimates are consistent with the larger-scale analysis of McDowell et al. (1983

Northwestern Pacific typhoon intensity controlled by changes in ocean temperatures.

Dominant climatic factors controlling the lifetime peak intensity of typhoons are determined from six decades of Pacific typhoon data. We find that upper ocean temperatures in the low-latitude northwestern Pacific (LLNWP) and sea surface temperatures in the central equatorial Pacific control the seasonal average lifetime peak intensity by setting the rate and duration of typhoon intensification, respectively. An anomalously strong LLNWP upper ocean warming has favored increased intensification rates and led to unprecedentedly high average typhoon intensity during the recent global warming hiatus period, despite a reduction in intensification duration tied to the central equatorial Pacific surface cooling. Continued LLNWP upper ocean warming as predicted under a moderate [that is, Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) 4.5] climate change scenario is expected to further increase the average typhoon intensity by an additional 14% by 2100

Optimal Parameterizing Manifolds for Anticipating Tipping Points and Higher-order Critical Transitions

A general, variational approach to derive low-order reduced systems is presented. The approach is based on the concept of optimal parameterizing manifold (OPM) that substitutes the more classical notions of invariant or slow manifold when breakdown of ''slaving'' occurs, i.e. when the unresolved variables cannot be expressed as an exact functional of the resolved ones anymore. The OPM provides, within a given class of parameterizations of the unresolved variables, the manifold that averages out optimally these variables as conditioned on the resolved ones. The class of parameterizations retained here is that of continuous deformations of parameterizations rigorously valid near the onset of instability. These deformations are produced through integration of auxiliary backward-forward (BF) systems built from the model's equations and lead to analytic formulas for parameterizations. In this modus operandi, the backward integration time is the key parameter to select per scale/variable to parameterize in order to derive the relevant parameterizations which are doomed to be no longer exact, away from instability onset, due to breakdown of slaving typically encountered e.g. for chaotic regimes. The selection criterion is then made through data-informed minimization of a least-square parameterization defect. It is thus shown, through optimization of the backward integration time per scale/variable to parameterize, that skilled OPM reduced systems can be derived for predicting with accuracy higher-order critical transitions or catastrophic tipping phenomena, while training our parameterization formulas for regimes prior to these transitions take place

Turbulence closure with small, local neural networks: Forced two-dimensional and β\beta-plane flows

We parameterize sub-grid scale (SGS) fluxes in sinusoidally forced two-dimensional turbulence on the $\beta$-plane at high Reynolds numbers (Re$\sim$25000) using simple 2-layer Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) having only O(1000)parameters, two orders of magnitude smaller than recent studies employing deeper CNNs with 8-10 layers; we obtain stable, accurate, and long-term online or a posteriori solutions at 16X downscaling factors. Our methodology significantly improves training efficiency and speed of online Large Eddy Simulations (LES) runs, while offering insights into the physics of closure in such turbulent flows. Our approach benefits from extensive hyperparameter searching in learning rate and weight decay coefficient space, as well as the use of cyclical learning rate annealing, which leads to more robust and accurate online solutions compared to fixed learning rates. Our CNNs use either the coarse velocity or the vorticity and strain fields as inputs, and output the two components of the deviatoric stress tensor. We minimize a loss between the SGS vorticity flux divergence (computed from the high-resolution solver) and that obtained from the CNN-modeled deviatoric stress tensor, without requiring energy or enstrophy preserving constraints. The success of shallow CNNs in accurately parameterizing this class of turbulent flows implies that the SGS stresses have a weak non-local dependence on coarse fields; it also aligns with our physical conception that small-scales are locally controlled by larger scales such as vortices and their strained filaments. Furthermore, 2-layer CNN-parameterizations are more likely to be interpretable and generalizable because of their intrinsic low dimensionality.Comment: 27 pages, 13 figure

Dynamics of wind-forced coherent anticyclones in the open ocean

We numerically study the dynamics of coherent anticyclonic eddies in the ocean interior. For the hydrostatic, rotating, stably stratified turbulence we use a high-resolution primitive equation model forced by small-scale winds in an idealized configuration. Many properties of the horizontal motions are found to be similar to those of two-dimensional and quasi-geostrophic turbulence. Major differences are a strong cyclone-anticyclone asymmetry linked to the straining field exerted by vortex Rossby waves, which is also found in shallow water flows, and the complex structure of the vertical velocity field, which we analyze in detail. Locally, the motion can become strongly ageostrophic, and vertical velocities associated with vortices can reach magnitudes and levels of spatial complexity akin to those reported for frontal regions. Transport and mixing properties of the flow field are further investigated by analyzing Lagrangian trajectories. Particles released in the pycnocline undergo large vertical excursions because of the vertical velocities associated to the vortices, with potentially important consequences for marine ecosystem dynamics

The impact on atmospheric CO2 of iron fertilization induced changes in the ocean's biological pump

© Author(s) 2008. This work is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. The definitive version was published in Biogeosciences 5 (2008): 385-406, doi:10.5194/bg-5-385-2008Using numerical simulations, we quantify the impact of changes in the ocean's biological pump on the air-sea balance of CO2 by fertilizing a small surface patch in the high-nutrient, low-chlorophyll region of the eastern tropical Pacific with iron. Decade-long fertilization experiments are conducted in a basin-scale, eddy-permitting coupled physical/biogeochemical/ecological model. In contrast to previous studies, we find that most of the dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) removed from the euphotic zone by the enhanced biological export is replaced by uptake of CO2 from the atmosphere. Atmospheric uptake efficiencies, the ratio of the perturbation in air-sea CO2 flux to the perturbation in export flux across 100 m, integrated over 10 years, are 0.75 to 0.93 in our patch size-scale experiments. The atmospheric uptake efficiency is insensitive to the duration of the experiment. The primary factor controlling the atmospheric uptake efficiency is the vertical distribution of the enhanced biological production and export. Iron fertilization at the surface tends to induce production anomalies primarily near the surface, leading to high efficiencies. In contrast, mechanisms that induce deep production anomalies (e.g. altered light availability) tend to have a low uptake efficiency, since most of the removed DIC is replaced by lateral and vertical transport and mixing. Despite high atmospheric uptake efficiencies, patch-scale iron fertilization of the ocean's biological pump tends to remove little CO2 from the atmosphere over the decadal timescale considered here.The majority of this work was funded by the Office of Science (BER) of the US Department of Energy through Grant No. DE-FG03-00ER63010. Additional funding was provided by the Information and Technology Research section of the US National Science Foundation (NG, HF, and SD) and ETH Zurich (NG)