Global ocean modeling and state estimation in support of climate research

During the last decade it has become obvious that the ocean circulation shows vigorous variability on a wide range of time and space scales and that the concept of a "sluggish" and slowly varying circulation is rather elusive. Increasing emphasis has to be put, therefore, on observing the rapidly changing ocean state on time scales ranging from weeks to decades and beyond, and on understanding the ocean's response to changing atmospheric forcing conditions. As outlined in various strategy and implementation documents (e.g., the implementation plans of WOCE, AMS, CLIVAR, and GODAE) a combination of the global ocean data sets with a state-of-the-art numerical circulation model is required to interpret the various diverse data sets and to produce the best possible estimates of the time-varying ocean circulation. The mechanism of ocean state estimates is a powerful tool for such a "synthesis" of observations, obtained on very complex space-time pattern, into one dynamically consistent picture of the global time-evolving ocean circulation. This process has much in common with ongoing analysis and reanalysis activities in the atmospheric community. But because the ocean is, and will remain for the foreseeable future, substantially under-sampled, the burden put on the modeling and estimations components is substantially larger than in the atmosphere. Moreover, the smaller dynamical eddy scales which need to be properly parameterized or resolved in ocean model simulations, put stringent requirements on computational resources for ongoing and participated climate research

Research Progress Reports: Fruit and Vegetable Processing and Technology Division, Department of Horticulture [1967]

Evaluation of snap bean varieties for processing / Wilbur A. Gould and William Hildebolt -- Evaluation of various grape cultivars for processing. I. Table wines ; Recommended fruit varieties for canning and freezing / J. F. Gallander -- Evaluation of tomato varieties for processing / W. A. Gould, J. R. Geisman, C. S. Parrott, J. H. McClelland and W. N. Brown -- The effect of different levels of sugar and acid on the quality of apple fruit juice blends / James Gallander and Harold Stammer -- Epidermal sloughing of snap beans as influenced by processing variables / William Hildebolt and W. A. Gould -- Effect of stannous chloride on the color of glass packed kraut / J. R. Geisman -- Proteins and enzymes in the apple fruit in relation to variety and maturation ; Proteins and enzymes in tomato fruits / Robert L. Clements -- Effect of food additives on quality of canned tomatoes / Wilbur A. Gould -- Effects of selective herbicides on the composition and quality of tomatoes / W. A. Gould, J. R. Geisman, E. K. Alban and John Deppen -- Trace levels of pesticide residues in agricultural commodities in marketing channels / W. A. Gould, J. R. Geisman, E. K. Alban, John Deppen, and P. van Pottlesberghe -- Removal of DDT residues by unit operations in preparing and processing spinach / J. R. Geisman, John Deppen and Benita Yao -- The use of chlorine dioxide in handling and holding mechanically harvested tomatoes / J. R. Geisman, Winston D. Bash, Edwin Schmidt, Jr., Linda Hamrick and W. A. Gould -- Effect of mechanical harvesting and handling of tomatoes on quality of canned tomatoes / Wilbur A. Gould, J. R. Geisman, Edwin Schmidt, Jr., John McClelland and W. N. Brow

Testing variational estimation of process parameters and initial conditions of an earth system model

We present a variational assimilation system around a coarse resolution Earth System Model (ESM) and apply it for estimating initial conditions and parameters of the model. The system is based on derivative information that is efficiently provided by the ESM's adjoint, which has been generated through automatic differentiation of the model's source code. In our variational approach, the length of the feasible assimilation window is limited by the size of the domain in control space over which the approximation by the derivative is valid. This validity domain is reduced by non-smooth process representations. We show that in this respect the ocean component is less critical than the atmospheric component. We demonstrate how the feasible assimilation window can be extended to several weeks by modifying the implementation of specific process representations and by switching off processes such as precipitation

Potential climatic transitions with profound impact on Europe

We discuss potential transitions of six climatic subsystems with large-scale impact on Europe, sometimes denoted as tipping elements. These are the ice sheets on Greenland and West Antarctica, the Atlantic thermohaline circulation, Arctic sea ice, Alpine glaciers and northern hemisphere stratospheric ozone. Each system is represented by co-authors actively publishing in the corresponding field. For each subsystem we summarize the mechanism of a potential transition in a warmer climate along with its impact on Europe and assess the likelihood for such a transition based on published scientific literature. As a summary, the ‘tipping’ potential for each system is provided as a function of global mean temperature increase which required some subjective interpretation of scientific facts by the authors and should be considered as a snapshot of our current understanding. <br/

Causes of the regional variability in observed sea level, sea surface temperature and ocean colour over the period 1993-2011

We analyse the regional variability in observed sea surface height (SSH), sea surface temperature (SST) and ocean colour (OC) from the ESA Climate Change Initiative (CCI) datasets over the period 1993-2011. The analysis focuses on the signature of the ocean large-scale climate fluctuations driven by the atmospheric forcing and do not address the mesoscale variability. We use the ECCO version 4 ocean reanalysis to unravel the role of ocean transport and surface buoyancy fluxes in the observed SSH, SST and OC variability. We show that the SSH regional variability is dominated by the steric effect (except at high latitude) and is mainly shaped by ocean heat transport divergences with some contributions from the surface heat fluxes forcing that can be significant regionally (confirming earlier results). This is in contrast with the SST regional variability, which is the result of the compensation of surface heat fluxes by ocean heat transport in the mixed layer and arises from small departures around this background balance. Bringing together the results of SSH and SST analyses, we show that SSH and SST bear some common variability. This is because both SSH and SST variability show significant contributions from the surface heat fluxes forcing. It is evidenced by the high correlation between SST and buoyancy forced SSH almost everywhere in the ocean except at high latitude. OC, which is determined by phytoplankton biomass, is governed by the availability of light and nutrients that essentially depend on climate fluctuations. For this reason OC show significant correlation with SST and SSH. We show that the correlation with SST display the same pattern as the correlation with SSH with a negative correlation in the tropics and subtropics and a positive correlation at high latitude. We discuss the reasons for this pattern

Factors associated with diversity, quantity and zoonotic potential of ectoparasites on urban mice and voles

Wild rodents are important hosts for tick larvae but co-infestations with other mites and insects are largely neglected. Small rodents were trapped at four study sites in Berlin, Germany, to quantify their ectoparasite diversity. Host-specific, spatial and temporal occurrence of ectoparasites was determined to assess their influence on direct and indirect zoonotic risk due to mice and voles in an urban agglomeration. Rodent-associated arthropods were diverse, including 63 species observed on six host species with an overall prevalence of 99%. The tick Ixodes ricinus was the most prevalent species, found on 56% of the rodents. The trapping location clearly affected the presence of different rodent species and, therefore, the occurrence of particular host-specific parasites. In Berlin, fewer temporary and periodic parasite species as well as non-parasitic species (fleas, chiggers and nidicolous Gamasina) were detected than reported from rural areas. In addition, abundance of parasites with low host-specificity (ticks, fleas and chiggers) apparently decreased with increasing landscape fragmentation associated with a gradient of urbanisation. In contrast, stationary ectoparasites, closely adapted to the rodent host, such as the fur mites Myobiidae and Listrophoridae, were most abundant at the two urban sites. A direct zoonotic risk of infection for people may only be posed by Nosopsyllus fasciatus fleas, which were prevalent even in the city centre. More importantly, peridomestic rodents clearly supported the life cycle of ticks in the city as hosts for their subadult stages. In addition to trapping location, season, host species, body condition and host sex, infestation with fleas, gamasid Laelapidae mites and prostigmatic Myobiidae mites were associated with significantly altered abundance of I. ricinus larvae on mice and voles. Whether this is caused by predation, grooming behaviour or interaction with the host immune system is unclear. The present study constitutes a basis to identify interactions and vector function of rodent-associated arthropods and their potential impact on zoonotic diseases

Chicken Pleiotrophin: Regulation of Tissue Specific Expression by Estrogen in the Oviduct and Distinct Expression Pattern in the Ovarian Carcinomas

Pleiotrophin (PTN) is a developmentally-regulated growth factor which is widely distributed in various tissues and also detected in many kinds of carcinomas. However, little is known about the PTN gene in chickens. In the present study, we found chicken PTN to be highly conserved with respect to mammalian PTN genes (91–92.6%) and its mRNA was most abundant in brain, heart and oviduct. This study focused on the PTN gene in the oviduct where it was detected in the glandular (GE) and luminal (LE) epithelial cells. Treatment of young chicks with diethylstilbesterol induced PTN mRNA and protein in GE and LE, but not in other cell types of the oviduct. Further, several microRNAs, specifically miR-499 and miR-1709 were discovered to influence PTN expression via its 3′-UTR which suggests that post-transcriptional regulation influences PTN expression in chickens. We also compared expression patterns and CpG methylation status of the PTN gene in normal and cancerous ovaries from chickens. Our results indicated that PTN is most abundant in the GE of adenocarcinoma of cancerous, but not normal ovaries of hens. Bisulfite sequencing revealed that 30- and 40% of −1311 and −1339 CpG sites are demethylated in ovarian cancer cells, respectively. Collectively, these results indicate that chicken PTN is a novel estrogen-induced gene expressed mainly in the oviductal epithelia implicating PTN regulation of oviduct development and egg formation, and also suggest that PTN is a biomarker for epithelial ovarian carcinoma that could be used for diagnosis and monitoring effects of therapies for the disease