Fhe application of electromagnetic-induction on the measurement of sea ice thickness in the Antarctic

As an important component of the cryosphere, sea ice is very sensitive to climate change. The study of sea ice physics needs accurate sea ice thickness. This paper presents an electromagnetic induction （EM） technique which can be used to measure the sea ice thickness distribution efficiently and its successful application in the Antarctic Neila Fjord. Based on the electrical properties of sea ice and seawater and the application of electromagnetic field theory, this technique can accurately detect the distance between the EM instrument and the ice/water interface to measure the sea ice thickness. Analyzing the apparent conductivity data obtained by the electromagnetic induction technique and drill-hole measurements at same location allows the construction of a transform equation for the apparent conductivity and sea ice thickness. The verification of the calculated sea ice thickness using this equation indicates that the electromagnetic induction technique is able to determine reliable sea ice thickness with an average relative error of only 5.5%. The ice thickness profiles show the sea ice distribution in Neila Fjord is basically level with a thickness of 0.8 - 1.4 m.     

Regional characteristics of the effects of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation on the sea level in the China Sea

Based on coastal tide level, satellite altimetry, and sea surface temperature (SST) data of offshore areas of China’s coast and the equatorial Pacific Ocean, the regional characteristics of the effects of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) on the sea level in the China Sea were investigated. Singular value decomposition results show a significant teleconnection between the sea level in the China Sea and the SST of the tropical Pacific Ocean; the correlation coefficient decreases from south to north. Data from tide gauges along China’s coast show that the seasonal sea-level variations are significantly correlated with the ENSO. In addition, China’s coast was divided into three regions based on distinctive regional characteristics. Results obtained show that the annual amplitude of sea level was low during El Niño developing years, and especially so during the El Niño year. The ENSO intensity determined the response intensity of the annual amplitude of the sea level. The response region (amplitude) was relatively large for strong ENSO intensities. Significant oscillation periods at a timescale of 4–7 years existed in the sea level of the three regions. The largest amplitude of oscillation was 1.5 cm, which was the fluctuation with the 7-year period in the South China Sea. The largest amplitude of oscillation in the East China Sea was about 1.3 cm. The amplitude of oscillation with the 6-year period in the Bohai Sea and Yellow Sea was the smallest (less than 1 cm).     

The characteristics of Quaternary activity of faults in the sea area near the Yangtze River mouth

Introduction As far as the frequency and magnitude are concerned, the earthquakes in the sea area to the east of Shanghai are far more strong than in land area with the largest one in the sea area near the Yangtze River mouth being MS=436, while in land, only MS=434 occurred on Sept. 1, 1624. As a moderately strong earthquake active area, the sea area near the Yangtze River mouth, may cause a potential risk to Shanghai. In 1971 and 1996, earthquakes with MS=5~6 occurred in this area. Geo…     

Prediction of the drag law for air–sea momentum exchange

In this paper, we use the inertial coupling relation as a similarity model for the air–sea boundary layer, to predict the 10-m drag coefficient. Excellent agreement with the commonly used statistical relationship of Garratt (1992) is found for a fully developed growing wind wave sea with a constant inertial drag coefficient, K_I = 1.5 × 10^–3. This suggests that the inertial coupling model can be used to realistically predict the 10 m drag coefficient under more general wind wave conditions.Acknowledgements The paper was completed while JATB was a Fellow at the Hanse-Wissenschaftskolleg in Delmenhorst, Germany, in July and August 2004. The comments of two anonymous reviewers are gratefully acknowledged.     

Interannual variability of the air–sea CO2 flux in the north Indian Ocean

A simple biogeochemical model coupled to an offline ocean tracer transport model driven by reanalysis ocean data is used to simulate the seasonal and interannual CO $_2$ flux variability in the northern Indian Ocean. The maximum of seasonal and interannual CO $_2$ emission variances in the northern Indian Ocean are located in the coastal Arabian Sea (AS) and Southern Peninsular India (SP) with a basin-wide seasonal amplitude and standard deviation of 0.044 $\pm $ 0.04 Pg C year $^{-1}$ . The area integrated CO $_2$ emissions from these two regions in the model are significantly correlated (above a 95 % level) with the observations of Takahashi et al. (Deep-Sea Res-II, 56:554–577, 2009). The interannual anomalies of CO $_2$ emission from the AS and SP are found as 40 and 30 % of their respective seasonal amplitudes. Both the Arabian Sea (AS) and Southern Peninsular India (SP) interannual CO $_2$ emission anomalies show a 3–4-year variability. The correlations of AS and SP CO $_2$ emission anomalies with the Indian Ocean Dipole/Zonal Mode (IODZM) and Southern Oscillation (SO) indices from 1980 to 1999 are 0.35, 0.21 and 0.32, 0.01 respectively. A 5-year window moving correlation analysis shows that the relationship of AS and SP CO $_2$ emission to the SO and IODZM are complementary to each other. During the years when the correlation of air–sea CO $_2$ emission with the IODZM is stronger, the corresponding correlation with the SO is weaker or opposite. The total change in pCO $_2$ is broken down into changes induced by the individual components such as dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC), sea surface temperature (SST), alkalinity, and salinity and found that (1) the effect of SST in the AS CO $_2$ emission increases (decreases) when the correlation of CO $_2$ emission with the IODZM is positive (negative), and (2) the SP CO $_2$ emission is strongly controlled by the circulation-driven DIC changes; however, this relation is found to be weaker when the SO correlates negatively with the SP CO $_2$ emission.     

Geological structure of the yellow sea area from regional gravity and magnetic interpretation

Regional gravity and aeromagnetic data covering the area of 32°- 38° N, 118°-127° E at the scale of 1：1,000,000 are coordinated and integrated in a synthetic study of the South China Yellow Sea and adjacent areas. Depth to magnetic crystalline basement and its structure are determined by magnetic anomaly inversion. Depth to and thickness of the Paleozoic rock are also revealed by gravity anomaly inversion with constrains of the basement and known seismic information from several profiles. Structure units, main faults, basin boundaries, and sub-suppressions are outlined on the basis of gravity data interpretation.     

Improved estimates of mean sea level changes in the German Bight over the last 166 years

In this paper, mean sea level changes in the German Bight, the south-eastern part of the North Sea, are analysed. Records from 13 tide gauges covering the entire German North Sea coastline and the period from 1843 to 2008 have been used to derive high quality relative mean sea level time series. Changes in mean sea level are assessed using non-linear smoothing techniques and linear trend estimations for different time spans. Time series from individual tide gauges are analysed and then ‘virtual station’ time series are constructed (by combining the individual records) which are representative of the German Bight and the southern and eastern regions of the Bight. An accelerated sea level rise is detected for a period at the end of the nineteenth century and for another one covering the last decades. The results show that there are regional differences in sea level changes along the coastline. Higher rates of relative sea level rise are detected for the eastern part of the German Bight in comparison to the southern part. This is most likely due to different rates of vertical land movement. In addition, different temporal behaviour of sea level change is found in the German Bight compared to wider regional and global changes, highlighting the urgent need to derive reliable regional sea level projections for coastal planning strategies.     

Effects of the air–sea coupling time frequency on the ocean response during Mediterranean intense events

The near-sea surface meteorological conditions associated with the Mediterranean heavy precipitation events constitute, on a short time scale, a strong forcing on the ocean mixed layer. This study addresses the question of the optimal time frequency of the atmospheric forcing to drive an ocean model in order to make it able to capture the fine scale ocean mixed layer response to severe meteorological conditions. The coupling time frequency should allow the ocean model to reproduce the formation of internal low-salty boundary layers due to sudden input of intense precipitation, as well as the cooling and deepening of the ocean mixed layer through large latent heat fluxes and stress under the intense low-level jet associated with these events. In this study, the one-dimensional ocean model is driven by 2.4-km atmospheric simulated fields on a case of Mediterranean heavy precipitation, varying the time resolution of the atmospheric forcing. The results show that using a finer temporal resolution than 1 h for the atmospheric forcing is not necessary, but a coarser temporal resolution (3 or 6 h) modifies the event course and intensity perceived by the ocean. Consequently, when using a too coarse temporal resolution forcing, typically 6 h, the ocean model fails to reproduce the ocean mixed layer fine scale response under the heavy rainfall pulses and the strong wind gusts.     

Long-term statistics of potentially hazardous sea states in the North Sea 1958–2014

Significant wave height and mean wave period are two of the most commonly used parameters to describe wave climate, wave climate variability, and their potential long-term changes. While these parameters are generally useful to characterize the distribution of waves within a given sea state, they provide less information about potentially high-risk situations. Over the recent years, a number of criteria were suggested that are considered to better characterize high-risk situations and which could bear a potential for the development of safety warning indices. Based on a multi-decadal high-resolution wind-wave hindcast, a climatology of such parameters is developed for the North Sea covering the years 1958–2014. More specifically, average conditions, inter-annual variability and long-term changes for unusually steep, rapidly developing and crossing sea states are considered. Generally, there are pronounced spatial variations in the frequency of such sea states, while over time, there is some seasonal and inter-annual variability but no substantial long-term trend could be identified.     

Charnock dynamics: a model for the velocity structure in the wave boundary layer of the air–sea interface

We present a unified model of the air–sea boundary layer, which takes account of the air–sea momentum exchange across the sea surface. The recognition of the importance of the velocity shears in the water (which comprise a frictional shear and the Stokes shear due to the wave motion) in determining the sea surface roughness is a distinctive feature of the analysis, which leads to a prediction of the Charnock constant (α) in terms of two independent parameters, namely the wave age and the ratio of the Stokes shear to the Eulerian shear in the water. This expression is used to interpret the large observational variability of the Charnock constant. The 10-m drag coefficient can also be expressed using similar reasoning, and the introduction of a relation in which the ratio of the frictional shear in the water to the frictional shear in the air decreases with the friction velocity yields predictive relations for the variation of the 10-m drag coefficient at very high wind speeds both in the open ocean and in wind–wave tanks. The physical interpretation of this relation is that the production of spray essentially returns momentum from the ocean to the atmosphere, and this process becomes progressively more important as the wind speed increases.     

The changes in La Niña induced summertime interannual variability of sea level anomaly along the western boundary of the Bay of Bengal

Ocean Dynamics - In this study, interannual variability and associated dynamics of sea level anomaly (SLA) along the western boundary of the Bay of Bengal (WBoB) during the summer...     

Carbon isotopic studies of individual lipids in organisms from the Nansha sea area, China

Sediments contain abundant lipid compounds in general, which are used as biomarker compounds to study organic matter sources and reconstruct the pa-laeoenvironments[1—7]. However, lipid compounds in sediments are generally a mixture of various genetic components so that it is difficult to correctly decouple their biological sources only by the results of bio-chemical researches. Carbon isotopic studies of indi-vidual sedimentary lipid compounds can discover their genetic information, which pr…     

Changhsingian sea level changes and brachiopod diversity in the upper Yangtze region

Sedimentary environment and distribution of brachiopods during the Changhsingian in Xingwen, Si-chuan Province of the upper Yangtze region, are statistically analyzed. Changing regularity in diversity of brachiopod is synthetically investigated based on qualitative and quantitative analysis of transgres-sion-regression cycles. The results show that the diversity of brachiopods in this region in the trans-gression (aggradation) sequence is higher than that in the regression (progradation) sequence. The brachiopods in this area began to diversify in the early Changhsingian. And the species diversity had four peak stages which are respectively in the middle Early Changhsingian, late Early Changhsingian, early Late Changhsingian and late Late Changhsingian. The species diversity reached its highest in the late Late Changhsingian but this is followed by a sharp decrease at the end-hanghsingian, indicating the mass extinction of most brachiopod species which were prosperous in the Late Paleozoic.     

Glacial meltwater and sea ice meltwater in the Prydz Bay, Antarctica

It has been well known by oceanographers that the World Ocean Circulation originates inNorth Atlantic near the Greenland, where in wintertime the cooled surface water descends to form North Atlantic Deep Waters (NADW). The NADW, when passing the Antarctic…     

Rapid physically driven inversion of the air–sea ice CO2 flux in the seasonal landfast ice off Barrow,Alaska after onset of surface melt

The air–sea ice CO₂ flux was measured over landfast sea ice in the Chukchi Sea, off Barrow, Alaska in late May 2008 with a chamber technique. The ice cover transitioned from a cold early spring to a warm late spring state, with an increase in air temperature and incipient surface melt. During melt, brine salinity and brine dissolved inorganic carbon concentration (DIC) decreased from 67.3 to 18.7 and 3977.6 to 1163.5 μmol kg⁻¹, respectively. In contrast, the salinity and DIC of under-ice water at depths of 3 and 5 m below the ice surface remained almost constant with average values of 32.4±0.3 (standard deviation) and 2163.1±16.8 μmol kg⁻¹, respectively. The air–sea ice CO₂ flux decreased from +0.7 to −1.0 mmol m⁻² day⁻¹ (where a positive value indicates CO₂ being released to the atmosphere from the ice surface). During this early to late spring transition, brought on by surface melt, sea ice shifted from a source to a sink for atmospheric CO₂, with a rapid decrease of brine DIC likely associated with a decrease in the partial pressure of CO₂ of brine from a supersaturated to an undersaturated state compared to the atmosphere. Formation of superimposed ice coincident with melt was not sufficient to shut down ice–air gas exchange.     

Spectra of a shallow sea—unmixing for class identification and monitoring of coastal waters

Ocean colour-based monitoring of water masses is a promising alternative to monitoring concentrations in heterogeneous coastal seas. Fuzzy methods, such as spectral unmixing, are especially well suited for recognition of water masses from their remote sensing reflectances. However, such models have not yet been applied for water classification and monitoring. In this study, a fully constrained endmember model with simulated endmembers was developed for water class identification in the shallow Wadden Sea and adjacent German Bight. Its performance was examined on in situ measured reflectances and on MERIS satellite data. Water classification by means of unmixing reflectance spectra proved to be successful. When the endmember model was applied to MERIS data, it was able to visualise well-known spatial, tidal, seasonal, and wind-related variations in optical properties in the heterogeneous Wadden Sea. Analyses show that the method is insensitive to small changes in endmembers. Therefore, it can be applied in similar coastal areas. For use in open ocean situations or coastal or inland waters with other specific inherent optical properties, re-simulation of the endmember spectra with local optical properties is required. However, such an adaptation requires only a limited number of local in situ measurements.