How long to oceanic tracer and proxy equilibrium
TL;DR: In this paper, a global ocean circulation model, forced to least-square consistency with modern data, is used to find lower bounds for the time taken by surface-injected passive tracers to reach equilibrium.
About: This article is published in Quaternary Science Reviews.The article was published on 2008-04-01. It has received 90 citations till now. The article focuses on the topics: Thermohaline circulation & North Atlantic Deep Water.
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors implemented the Tracers of Phytoplankton with Allometric Zooplsankton (TOPAZ) ocean biogeochemistry model into the National Institute of Meteorological Sciences ESM.
Abstract: Earth System Models (ESMs) simulating the interrelationship between atmospheric chemistry, ocean biogeochemistry, terrestrial ecology, and climate processes are used to understand current climate and predict future climate change. However, ocean biogeochemical results show wide variability between ESMs. We have implemented the Tracers of Phytoplankton with Allometric Zooplankton (TOPAZ) ocean biogeochemistry model into the National Institute of Meteorological Sciences ESM. The offline version (Nucleus for European Modelling of the Ocean – Tracers of Ocean Phytoplankton with Allometric Zooplankton v2 (NEMO-TOPAZ) of the coupled global ocean biogeochemistry model has been evaluated compared to both observational data and another biogeochemistry model (NEMO-Pelagic Interactions Scheme for Carbon and Ecosystem Studies volume 2 [PISCES]) with the same ocean physics model. Biogeochemical tracers simulated by these models showed horizontal and vertical spatial distributions similar to observations. However, limitations caused by the shared ocean physical model were found in both models. While NEMO-TOPAZ tended to overestimate surface chlorophyll and nutrients, variation of simulated equatorial surface chlorophyll has a significant relationship with the El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) consistent with the observational result. NEMO-TOPAZ achieved superior simulation of dissolved inorganic carbon and alkalinity along with vertical distributions of biogeochemical variables in the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans. For nutrients, NEMO-PISCES showed better results overall. This model will improve scientific understanding of ocean biogeochemical processes and can be used in combination with other models for other components of the Earth’s system to develop a new ESM.
6 citations
01 Jan 2014
TL;DR: The role of upper-Ocean mixing in large-scale Ocean and Climate Dynamics Georgy Eduardovich Manucharyan as mentioned in this paper has been discussed in detail in this paper.
Abstract: The Role of Upper-Ocean Mixing in Large-Scale Ocean and Climate Dynamics Georgy Eduardovich Manucharyan
6 citations
Cites background from "How long to oceanic tracer and prox..."
...The deep ocean continues its adjustment on longer time scales (centennial to millennial) that should involve diapycnal diffusion throughout the global ocean [Wunsch and Heimbach, 2008] and processes in the Southern Ocean [Allison et al....
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01 Jan 2014
TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigate the cause and feasibility of a highly and salinity stratified deep ocean at the last glacial maximum (LGM, approximately 20,000 years BP) and work to increase the amount of information they can glean about the past ocean from pore fluid profiles of oxygen isotopes and chloride.
Abstract: The search for reliable proxies of past deep ocean temperature and salinity has proved difficult, thereby limiting our ability to understand the coupling of ocean circulation and climate over glacial-interglacial timescales. Previous inferences of deep ocean temperature and salinity from sediment pore fluid oxygen isotopes and chlorinity indicate that the deep ocean density structure at the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM, approximately 20,000 years BP) was set by salinity, and that the density contrast between northern and southern sourced deep waters was markedly greater than in the modern ocean. High density stratification could help explain the marked contrast in carbon isotope distribution recorded in the LGM ocean relative to that we observe today, but what made the ocean's density structure so different at the LGM? How did it evolve from one state to another? Further, given the sparsity of the LGM temperature and salinity data set, what else can we learn by increasing the spatial density of proxy records? We investigate the cause and feasibility of a highly and salinity stratified deep ocean at the LGM and we work to increase the amount of information we can glean about the past ocean from pore fluid profiles of oxygen isotopes and chloride. Using a coupled ocean--sea ice--ice shelf cavity model we test whether the deep ocean density structure at the LGM can be explained by ice--ocean interactions over the Antarctic continental shelves, and show that a large contribution of the LGM salinity stratification can be explained through lower ocean temperature. In order to extract the maximum information from pore fluid profiles of oxygen isotopes and chloride we evaluate several inverse methods for ill-posed problems and their ability to recover bottom water histories from sediment pore fluid profiles. We demonstrate that Bayesian Markov Chain Monte Carlo parameter estimation techniques enable us to robustly recover the full solution space of bottom water histories, not only at the LGM, but through the most recent deglaciation and the Holocene up to the present. Finally, we evaluate a non-destructive pore fluid sampling technique, Rhizon samplers, in comparison to traditional squeezing methods and show that despite their promise, Rhizons are unlikely to be a good sampling tool for pore fluid measurements of oxygen isotopes and chloride.
5 citations
Cites background from "How long to oceanic tracer and prox..."
...Recent studies have shown that the LGM occurred at different times for different glaciers (Clark et al., 2009), which calls into question the idea of a synchronous LGM in the ocean, particularly with the knowledge that the ocean equilibration timescales are long (Wunsch and Heimbach, 2008)....
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..., 2009), which calls into question the idea of a synchronous LGM in the ocean, particularly with the knowledge that the ocean equilibration timescales are long (Wunsch and Heimbach, 2008)....
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01 Aug 2021
4 citations
Additional excerpts
...10.1029/2020PA004187 2 of 13 Wunsch & Heimbach, 2008)....
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01 May 2011
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examined the linkages between salinity and oxygen isotope ratios of sea-water recorded by foraminifers, and their potential temporal and spatial variability, especially in the northern North Atlantic and the Arctic oceans.
Abstract: Since the reassessment of oxygen isotope paleotemperatures by N. Shackleton in the late 60s, most papers using isotopic records from planktic or benthic foraminifers imply a direct relationship between oxygen isotopes in seawater and the ice/ocean volume, thus some linkage with salinity, sea level, etc. Such assumptions are also made when incorporating "isotopic modules" in coupled models. Here, we will further examine the linkages between salinity and oxygen isotope ratios of sea-water recorded by foraminifers, and their potential temporal and spatial variability, especially in the northern North Atlantic and the Arctic oceans. If temporal and spatial changes in the isotopic composition of precipitations and ice meltwaters tune the isotopic properties of the fresh water end-member that dilutes the ocean, rates of sea-ice formation and evaporation at the ocean surface play a further role on the salt and oxygen isotope contents of water masses. Thus, the oxygen 18-salinity relationship carries a specific isotopic signature for any given water mass. At the ocean scale, residence time and mixing of these water masses, as well as the time dependent-achievement of proxy-tracer equilibrium, will also result in variable recordings of mass transfers into the hydrosphere, notable between ice-sheets and ocean. Since these records in water mass may vary in both amplitude and time, direct correlations of isotopic records will potentially be misleading. Implications of such issues on the interpretation of oxygen isotope records from the sub-arctic seas will be discussed, as well as the inherent flaws of such records due to sedimentological and or ecological parameters.
4 citations
Cites background or methods from "How long to oceanic tracer and prox..."
...Firstly, it has been shown that "major gradients exist, laterally, between the abyssal North Atlantic and North Pacific, and vertically over much of the ocean, persisting for periods longer than 2000 years and with magnitudes bearing little or no relation to radiocarbon ages" [22]....
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...6‰, suggesting that the complete homogenization of the LSW required a few thousand years, as suggested by Wunsch and Heimbach's experiments [22]....
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References
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TL;DR: The NCEP/NCAR 40-yr reanalysis uses a frozen state-of-the-art global data assimilation system and a database as complete as possible, except that the horizontal resolution is T62 (about 210 km) as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: The NCEP and NCAR are cooperating in a project (denoted “reanalysis”) to produce a 40-year record of global analyses of atmospheric fields in support of the needs of the research and climate monitoring communities. This effort involves the recovery of land surface, ship, rawinsonde, pibal, aircraft, satellite, and other data; quality controlling and assimilating these data with a data assimilation system that is kept unchanged over the reanalysis period 1957–96. This eliminates perceived climate jumps associated with changes in the data assimilation system. The NCEP/NCAR 40-yr reanalysis uses a frozen state-of-the-art global data assimilation system and a database as complete as possible. The data assimilation and the model used are identical to the global system implemented operationally at the NCEP on 11 January 1995, except that the horizontal resolution is T62 (about 210 km). The database has been enhanced with many sources of observations not available in real time for operations, provided b...
28,145 citations
Book•
31 Dec 1959
TL;DR: In this paper, a classic account describes the known exact solutions of problems of heat flow, with detailed discussion of all the most important boundary value problems, including boundary value maximization.
Abstract: This classic account describes the known exact solutions of problems of heat flow, with detailed discussion of all the most important boundary value problems.
21,807 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a new parameterization of oceanic boundary layer mixing is developed to accommodate some of this physics, including a scheme for determining the boundary layer depth h, where the turbulent contribution to the vertical shear of a bulk Richardson number is parameterized.
Abstract: If model parameterizations of unresolved physics, such as the variety of upper ocean mixing processes, are to hold over the large range of time and space scales of importance to climate, they must be strongly physically based. Observations, theories, and models of oceanic vertical mixing are surveyed. Two distinct regimes are identified: ocean mixing in the boundary layer near the surface under a variety of surface forcing conditions (stabilizing, destabilizing, and wind driven), and mixing in the ocean interior due to internal waves, shear instability, and double diffusion (arising from the different molecular diffusion rates of heat and salt). Mixing schemes commonly applied to the upper ocean are shown not to contain some potentially important boundary layer physics. Therefore a new parameterization of oceanic boundary layer mixing is developed to accommodate some of this physics. It includes a scheme for determining the boundary layer depth h, where the turbulent contribution to the vertical shear of a bulk Richardson number is parameterized. Expressions for diffusivity and nonlocal transport throughout the boundary layer are given. The diffusivity is formulated to agree with similarity theory of turbulence in the surface layer and is subject to the conditions that both it and its vertical gradient match the interior values at h. This nonlocal “K profile parameterization” (KPP) is then verified and compared to alternatives, including its atmospheric counterparts. Its most important feature is shown to be the capability of the boundary layer to penetrate well into a stable thermocline in both convective and wind-driven situations. The diffusivities of the aforementioned three interior mixing processes are modeled as constants, functions of a gradient Richardson number (a measure of the relative importance of stratification to destabilizing shear), and functions of the double-diffusion density ratio, Rρ. Oceanic simulations of convective penetration, wind deepening, and diurnal cycling are used to determine appropriate values for various model parameters as weak functions of vertical resolution. Annual cycle simulations at ocean weather station Papa for 1961 and 1969–1974 are used to test the complete suite of parameterizations. Model and observed temperatures at all depths are shown to agree very well into September, after which systematic advective cooling in the ocean produces expected differences. It is argued that this cooling and a steady salt advection into the model are needed to balance the net annual surface heating and freshwater input. With these advections, good multiyear simulations of temperature and salinity can be achieved. These results and KPP simulations of the diurnal cycle at the Long-Term Upper Ocean Study (LOTUS) site are compared with the results of other models. It is demonstrated that the KPP model exchanges properties between the mixed layer and thermocline in a manner consistent with observations, and at least as well or better than alternatives.
3,756 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a subgrid-scale form for mesoscale eddy mixing on isopycnal surfaces is proposed for use in non-eddy-resolving ocean circulation models.
Abstract: A subgrid-scale form for mesoscale eddy mixing on isopycnal surfaces is proposed for use in non-eddy-resolving ocean circulation models. The mixing is applied in isopycnal coordinates to isopycnal layer thickness, or inverse density gradient, as well as to passive scalars, temperature and salinity. The transformation of these mixing forms to physical coordinates is also presented.
3,107 citations
"How long to oceanic tracer and prox..." refers methods in this paper
...The underlying numerical code is that of Marshall et al. (1997) as modified by the ECCO projects in the interim, and includes the Large et al. (1994) mixed layer formulation, and the Gent and McWilliams (1990) eddy-flux parameterization....
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TL;DR: A preconditioner is used which, in the hydrostatic limit, is an exact integral of the Poisson operator and so leads to a single algorithm that seamlessly moves from nonhydrostatic to hydrostatic limits, competitive with the fastest ocean climate models in use today.
Abstract: The numerical implementation of an ocean model based on the incompressible Navier Stokes equations which is designed for studies of the ocean circulation on horizontal scales less than the depth of the ocean right up to global scale is described. A "pressure correction" method is used which is solved as a Poisson equation for the pressure field with Neumann boundary conditions in a geometry as complicated as that of the ocean basins. A major objective of the study is to make this inversion, and hence nonhydrostatic ocean modeling, efficient on parallel computers. The pressure field is separated into surface, hydrostatic, and nonhydrostatic components. First, as in hydrostatic models, a two-dimensional problem is inverted for the surface pressure which is then made use of in the three-dimensional inversion for the nonhydrostatic pressure. Preconditioned conjugate-gradient iteration is used to invert symmetric elliptic operators in both two and three dimensions. Physically motivated preconditioners are designed which are efficient at reducing computation and minimizing communication between processors. Our method exploits the fact that as the horizontal scale of the motion becomes very much larger than the vertical scale, the motion becomes more and more hydrostatic and the three- dimensional Poisson operator becomes increasingly anisotropic and dominated by the vertical axis. Accordingly, a preconditioner is used which, in the hydrostatic limit, is an exact integral of the Poisson operator and so leads to a single algorithm that seamlessly moves from nonhydrostatic to hydrostatic limits. Thus in the hydrostatic limit the model is "fast," competitive with the fastest ocean climate models in use today based on the hydrostatic primitive equations. But as the resolution is increased, the model dynamics asymptote smoothly to the Navier Stokes equations and so can be used to address small- scale processes. A "finite-volume" approach is employed to discretize the model in space in which property fluxes are defined normal to faces that delineate the volumes. The method makes possible a novel treatment of the boundary in which cells abutting the bottom or coast may take on irregular shapes and be "shaved" to fit the boundary. The algorithm can conveniently exploit massively parallel computers and suggests a domain decomposition which allocates vertical columns of ocean to each processing unit. The resulting model, which can handle arbitrarily complex geometry, is efficient and scalable and has been mapped on to massively parallel multiprocessors such as the Connection Machine (CM5) using data-parallel FORTRAN and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology data-flow machine MONSOON using the implicitly parallel language Id. Details of the numerical implementation of a model which has been designed for the study of dynamical processes in the ocean from the convective, through the geostrophic eddy, up to global scale are set out. The "kernel" algorithm solves the incompressible Navier Stokes equations on the sphere, in a geometry as complicated as that of the ocean basins with ir- regular coastlines and islands. (Here we use the term "Navier Stokes" to signify that the full nonhydrostatic equations are being employed; it does not imply a particular constitutive relation. The relevant equations for modeling the full complex- ity of the ocean include, as here, active tracers such as tem- perature and salt.) It builds on ideas developed in the compu- tational fluid community. The numerical challenge is to ensure that the evolving velocity field remains nondivergent. Most
2,315 citations
"How long to oceanic tracer and prox..." refers methods in this paper
...The underlying numerical code is that of Marshall et al. (1997) as modified by the ECCO projects in the interim, and includes the Large et al. (1994) mixed layer formulation, and the Gent and McWilliams (1990) eddy-flux parameterization....
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