Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

About: Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution is a nonprofit organization based out in Falmouth, Massachusetts, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Mantle (geology). The organization has 5685 authors who have published 18396 publications receiving 1202050 citations. The organization is also known as: WHOI.

A Vulnerability Assessment of Fish and Invertebrates to Climate Change on the Northeast U.S. Continental Shelf.

Abstract: Climate change and decadal variability are impacting marine fish and invertebrate species worldwide and these impacts will continue for the foreseeable future. Quantitative approaches have been developed to examine climate impacts on productivity, abundance, and distribution of various marine fish and invertebrate species. However, it is difficult to apply these approaches to large numbers of species owing to the lack of mechanistic understanding sufficient for quantitative analyses, as well as the lack of scientific infrastructure to support these more detailed studies. Vulnerability assessments provide a framework for evaluating climate impacts over a broad range of species with existing information. These methods combine the exposure of a species to a stressor (climate change and decadal variability) and the sensitivity of species to the stressor. These two components are then combined to estimate an overall vulnerability. Quantitative data are used when available, but qualitative information and expert opinion are used when quantitative data is lacking. Here we conduct a climate vulnerability assessment on 82 fish and invertebrate species in the Northeast U.S. Shelf including exploited, forage, and protected species. We define climate vulnerability as the extent to which abundance or productivity of a species in the region could be impacted by climate change and decadal variability. We find that the overall climate vulnerability is high to very high for approximately half the species assessed; diadromous and benthic invertebrate species exhibit the greatest vulnerability. In addition, the majority of species included in the assessment have a high potential for a change in distribution in response to projected changes in climate. Negative effects of climate change are expected for approximately half of the species assessed, but some species are expected to be positively affected (e.g., increase in productivity or move into the region). These results will inform research and management activities related to understanding and adapting marine fisheries management and conservation to climate change and decadal variability.

Spectral wave attenuation by bottom friction: theory

Abstract: Based on the linearized form of the boundary layer equations and a simple eddy viscosity formulation of shear stress, the turbulent bottom boundary layer flow is obtained for a wave motion specified by its directional spectrum. Closure is obtained by requiring the solution to reduce, in the limit, to that of a simple harmonic wave. The resulting dissipation is obtained in spectral form with a single friction factor determined from knowledge of the bottom roughness and an equivalent monochromatic wave having the same root-mean-square near-bottom orbital velocity and excursion amplitude as the specified wave spectrum. The total spectral dissipation rate is obtained by integration and compared with the average dissipation obtained from a model considering the statistics of individual waves defined by their maximum orbital velocity and zero-crossing period. The agreement between the two different evaluations of total spectral dissipation supports the validity of the spectral dissipation model.

On the oscillatory instability of a differentially heated fluid loop

Abstract: A theoretical discussion is given of the motion of a fluid contained in a tube forming a closed loop that is heated from below and cooled from above. The fluid is assumed to have uniform temperature over each cross-section, and the heat transfer is assumed proportional to the difference between the local temperatures of the fluid and the tube. The latter temperature is prescribed. The system has one steady solution with warm fluid rising in one branch and cold fluid sinking in the other. This solution may, however, become unstable in an oscillatory manner. A weak instability takes the form of pulsations, the motion being always of one sign, while a strong instability takes the form of oscillations with zero mean motion. These oscillations are irregular and do not repeat themselves even over very long times.These unstable motions are associated with thermal anomalies in the fluid that are advected materially around the loop. The anomalies amplify through the correlated variations in flow rate. A warm pocket of fluid creates maximum flow rate going through the upper part and minimum flow rate going through the lower part of the loop. Accordingly it passes quicker through the heat sink than through the heat source, and the latter becomes more effective. Similarly, the heat sink acts more effectively on a cold pocket of fluid.The curve of neutral stability is worked out as a function of the two parameters of the problem, a non-dimensional gravity and a non-dimensional friction coefficient. The instability has also been studied by direct numerical time integration of the model equations.It is suggested that the mechanism of instability found for this model operates also in more complicated systems, and can explain the pulsative type of motions observed recently in certain convection experiments.