Use of SF5CF3 for ocean tracer release experiments

Author Posting. © American Geophysical Union, 2008. This article is posted here by permission of American Geophysical Union for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Geophysical Research Letters 35 (2008): L04602, doi:10.1029/2007GL032799.SF6 tracer release experiments (TREs) have provided fundamental insights in many areas of Oceanography. Recently, SF6 has emerged as a powerful transient tracer, generating a need for an alternative tracer for large-scale ocean TREs. SF5CF3 has the potential to replace SF6 in TREs, due to similarities in their properties and behavior, as well as techniques for injection, sampling, and analysis. The suitability of SF5CF3 for TREs was examined in Santa Monica Basin, off the coast of Southern California. In January 2005, a mixture of ca. 10 mol of both SF6 and SF5CF3 was injected on an isopycnal surface near 800 m depth. Over the next 23 months, concentrations of the two tracers mirrored each other very closely, indicating that SF5CF3 is a viable replacement for SF6 in ocean TREs. The mixing parameters inferred from the experiment confirmed the results from an earlier SF6 TRE in the Santa Monica Basin.Funding was provided by the US National Science Foundation through OCE0425404 to W. Smethie and D. Ho and OCE0425197 to J. Ledwell

Hydrographic data from Endeavor 223 : formation and spreading of the shallow component of the North Atlantic deep western boundary current

In March-April, 1991, a 34-day hydrographic cruise aboard R/V Endeavor was undertaken to investigate the formation of the shallow component of the North Atlantic Deep Western Boundary Current (DWBC). Forty-seven stations were occupied, including 4 crossings of the DWBC. Five of the stations comprise a detailed CID/XBT survey taken in the region of a lens of newly ventilated water. Two additional stations were occupied in the central part of the Labrador Sea. Dissolved Oxygen, Nitrate, Nitrite, Phosphate, Silcate, and Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) F-11 and F-12 were measured at all stations. F-113 measurements were taken in the latter part of the cruise, and Tritium and Helium were measured at selected stations. An acoustic transport (POGO) float was deployed at each station to measure average velocity directly over the upper 1000-1500 meters. The shipboard Acoustic Doppler Current Profier (ADCP) measured upper layer currents throughout the cruise. Eighty-four XBTs were taken. This report presents vertical profiles and sections of the bottle and CTD data, a vector map of the average POGO currents, and listings of the bottle data. Tritium and Helium data are listed in an appendix.Funding was provided by the National Science Foundation through Contract No, OCE90-18409

Hydrographic data from Endeavor 214 : a study of the Gulf Stream - Deep Western Boundary Current crossover

In late June, 1990, a 17-day cruise aboard R/V ENDEAVOR was undertaken to investigate the manner in which the Deep Western Boundary Current (DWBC) crosses under the Gulf Stream. Forty-four CTD casts, comprising five sections, were made along with bottle measurements of Dissolved Oxygen, Nitrate, Nitrite, Phosphate, Silica, F-1l, and F-12. An acoustic transport float (POGO) was deployed at each station to obtain a measurement of the upper layer transport. The shipboard Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler (ADCP) measured currents thoughout the cruise. This report presents vertical profiles and sections of the bottle and CTD data a vector map of the average POGO currents, and listings of the bottle data.Funding was provided by the National Science Foundation and the Office of Naval Research under grant Number OCE90-09464

The Transient Tracers in the Ocean (TTO) program: The North Atlantic Study, 1981; The Tropical Atlantic Study, 1983

The scientific papers here collected result from the Transient Tracers in the Ocean (TTO) program. The two parts of this major geochemical and physical oceanographie expedition took place in the North Atlantic Ocean in 1981 and in the Tropical Atlantic in 1983 on the research vessel Knorr of the Woods Hole Oceanographie Institution

Formation and spreading of Red Sea Outflow Water in the Red Sea

Author Posting. © American Geophysical Union, 2015. This article is posted here by permission of American Geophysical Union for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans 120 (2015): 6542–6563, doi:10.1002/2015JC010751.Hydrographic data, chlorofluorocarbon-12 (CFC-12) and sulfur hexafluoride (SF6) measurements collected in March 2010 and September–October 2011 in the Red Sea, as well as an idealized numerical experiment are used to study the formation and spreading of Red Sea Outflow Water (RSOW) in the Red Sea. Analysis of inert tracers, potential vorticity distributions, and model results confirm that RSOW is formed through mixed-layer deepening caused by sea surface buoyancy loss in winter in the northern Red Sea and reveal more details on RSOW spreading rates, pathways, and vertical structure. The southward spreading of RSOW after its formation is identified as a layer with minimum potential vorticity and maximum CFC-12 and SF6. Ventilation ages of seawater within the RSOW layer, calculated from the partial pressure of SF6 (pSF6), range from 2 years in the northern Red Sea to 15 years at 17°N. The distribution of the tracer ages is in agreement with the model circulation field which shows a rapid transport of RSOW from its formation region to the southern Red Sea where there are longer circulation pathways and hence longer residence time due to basin wide eddies. The mean residence time of RSOW within the Red Sea estimated from the pSF6 age is 4.7 years. This time scale is very close to the mean transit time (4.8 years) for particles from the RSOW formation region to reach the exit at the Strait of Bab el Mandeb in the numerical experiment.King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) Grant Numbers: USA 00002, KSA 00011, KSA 00011/02; National Science Foundation; WHOI Academic Program Office Grant Number: OCE09270172016-03-2

Time series measurements of transient tracers and tracer-derived transport in the Deep Western Boundary Current between the Labrador Sea and the subtropical Atlantic Ocean at Line W

Author Posting. © American Geophysical Union, 2016. This article is posted here by permission of American Geophysical Union for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans 121 (2016): 8115–8138, doi:10.1002/2016JC011759.Time series measurements of the nuclear fuel reprocessing tracer 129I and the gas ventilation tracer CFC-11 were undertaken on the AR7W section in the Labrador Sea (1997–2014) and on Line W (2004–2014), located over the US continental slope off Cape Cod, to determine advection and mixing time scales for the transport of Denmark Strait Overflow Water (DSOW) within the Deep Western Boundary Current (DWBC). Tracer measurements were also conducted in 2010 over the continental rise southeast of Bermuda to intercept the equatorward flow of DSOW by interior pathways. The Labrador Sea tracer and hydrographic time series data were used as input functions in a boundary current model that employs transit time distributions to simulate the effects of mixing and advection on downstream tracer distributions. Model simulations of tracer levels in the boundary current core and adjacent interior (shoulder) region with which mixing occurs were compared with the Line W time series measurements to determine boundary current model parameters. These results indicate that DSOW is transported from the Labrador Sea to Line W via the DWBC on a time scale of 5–6 years corresponding to a mean flow velocity of 2.7 cm/s while mixing between the core and interior regions occurs with a time constant of 2.6 years. A tracer section over the southern flank of the Bermuda rise indicates that the flow of DSOW that separated from the DWBC had undergone transport through interior pathways on a time scale of 9 years with a mixing time constant of 4 years.US NSF supported this work. Grant Numbers: OCE-0241354, OCE-0726720, OCE-0926848, OCE13-328342017-05-1

Analysis of groundwater dynamics in the complex aquifer system of Kazan Trona, Turkey, using environmental tracers and noble gases

The Eocene deposits of Kazan Basin in Turkey contain a rare trona mineral which is planned to be extracted by solution mining. The complex flow dynamics and mixing mechanisms as noted from previous hydraulic and hydrochemical data need to be augmented with environmental tracer and noble gas data to develop a conceptual model of the system for the assessment of the impacts of the mining and to develop sustainable groundwater management policies throughout the area. The tracers used include the stable isotopes of water (δ²H, δ¹⁸O), δ¹³C and ¹⁴C of dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC), tritium (³H), the chlorofluorocarbons CFC-11 and CFC-12, and the noble gases He and Ne. The system studied consists of three aquifers: shallow, middle, and deep. CFC data indicate modern recharge in the shallow system. The estimates of ages through ¹⁴C dating for the deeper aquifer system are up to 34,000 years. Helium concentrations cover a wide range of values from 5 × 10⁻⁸ to 1.5 × 10⁻⁵ cm³ STP/g. ³He/⁴He ratios vary from 0.09R_A to 1.29R_A (where R_A is the atmospheric ³He/4He ratio of 1.384 × 10⁻⁶), the highest found in water from the shallow aquifer. Mantle-derived 3He is present in some of the samples indicating upward groundwater movement, possibly along a NE–SW-striking fault-like feature in the basin

Ventilation of the Arctic Ocean: Mean ages and inventories of anthropogenic CO2 and CFC-11

The Arctic Ocean constitutes a large body of water that is still relatively poorly surveyed because of logistical difficulties, although the importance of the Arctic Ocean for global circulation and climate is widely recognized. For instance, the concentration and inventory of anthropogenic CO2 (C ant) in the Arctic Ocean are not properly known despite its relatively large volume of well-ventilated waters. In this work, we have synthesized available transient tracer measurements (e.g., CFCs and SF6) made during more than two decades by the authors. The tracer data are used to estimate the ventilation of the Arctic Ocean, to infer deep-water pathways, and to estimate the Arctic Ocean inventory of C ant. For these calculations, we used the transit time distribution (TTD) concept that makes tracer measurements collected over several decades comparable with each other. The bottom water in the Arctic Ocean has CFC values close to the detection limit, with somewhat higher values in the Eurasian Basin. The ventilation time for the intermediate water column is shorter in the Eurasian Basin (∼200 years) than in the Canadian Basin (∼300 years). We calculate the Arctic Ocean C ant inventory range to be 2.5 to 3.3 Pg-C, normalized to 2005, i.e., ∼2% of the global ocean C ant inventory despite being composed of only ∼1% of the global ocean volume. In a similar fashion, we use the TTD field to calculate the Arctic Ocean inventory of CFC-11 to be 26.2 ± 2.6 × 106 moles for year 1994, which is ∼5% of the global ocean CFC-11 inventor

Unabated bottom water warming and freshening in the south Pacific Ocean.

Author Posting. © American Geophysical Union, 2019. This article is posted here by permission of American Geophysical Union for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Journal of Geophysical Research-Oceans 124(3), (2019): 1778-1794, doi:10.1029/2018JC014775.Abyssal ocean warming contributed substantially to anthropogenic ocean heat uptake and global sea level rise between 1990 and 2010. In the 2010s, several hydrographic sections crossing the South Pacific Ocean were occupied for a third or fourth time since the 1990s, allowing for an assessment of the decadal variability in the local abyssal ocean properties among the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s. These observations from three decades reveal steady to accelerated bottom water warming since the 1990s. Strong abyssal (z > 4,000 m) warming of 3.5 (±1.4) m°C/year (m°C = 10−3 °C) is observed in the Ross Sea, directly downstream from bottom water formation sites, with warming rates of 2.5 (±0.4) m°C/year to the east in the Amundsen‐Bellingshausen Basin and 1.3 (±0.2) m°C/year to the north in the Southwest Pacific Basin, all associated with a bottom‐intensified descent of the deepest isotherms. Warming is consistently found across all sections and their occupations within each basin, demonstrating that the abyssal warming is monotonic, basin‐wide, and multidecadal. In addition, bottom water freshening was strongest in the Ross Sea, with smaller amplitude in the Amundsen‐Bellingshausen Basin in the 2000s, but is discernible in portions of the Southwest Pacific Basin by the 2010s. These results indicate that bottom water freshening, stemming from strong freshening of Ross Shelf Waters, is being advected along deep isopycnals and mixed into deep basins, albeit on longer timescales than the dynamically driven, wave‐propagated warming signal. We quantify the contribution of the warming to local sea level and heat budgets.S. G. P. was supported by a U.S. GO‐SHIP postdoctoral fellowship through NSF grant OCE‐1437015, which also supported L. D. T. and S. M. and collection of U.S. GO‐SHIP data since 2014 on P06, S4P, P16, and P18. G. C. J. is supported by the Global Ocean Monitoring and Observation Program, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), U.S. Department of Commerce and NOAA Research. B. M. S and S. E. W. were supported by the Australian Government Department of the Environment and CSIRO through the Australian Climate Change Science Programme and by the National Environmental Science Program. We are grateful for the hard work of the science parties, officers, and crew of all the research cruises on which these CTD data were collected. We also thank the two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments that improve the manuscript. This is PMEL contribution 4870. All CTD data sets used in this analysis are publicly available at the website (https://cchdo.ucsd.edu).2019-08-2