Northward transport of pacific summer water along the Northwind Ridge in the Western Arctic Ocean

The recent sea-ice reduction in the Arctic Ocean is not spatially uniform, but is disproportionally large around the Northwind Ridge and Chukchi Plateau compared to elsewhere in the Canada Basin. In the Northwind Ridge region, Pacific Summer Water (PSW) delivered from the Bering Sea occupies the subsurface layer. The spatial distribution of warm PSW shows a quite similar pattern to the recent ice retreat, suggesting the influence of PSW on the sea-ice reduction. To understand the regionality of the recent ice retreat, we examine the dynamics and timing of the delivery of the PSW into this region. Here, we adopt a two-layer linearized potential vorticity equation to investigate the behavior of Rossby waves in the presence of a topographic discontinuity in the high latitude ocean. The analytical results show a quite different structure from those of mid-latitude basins due to the small value of β. Incident barotropic waves excited by the sea-ice motion with large annual variation can be scattered into both barotropic and baroclinic modes at the discontinuity. Since the scattered baroclinic Rossby wave with annual frequency cannot propagate freely, a strong baroclinic current near the topographic discontinuity is established. The seasonal variation of current near the topographic discontinuity would cause a kind of selective switching system for shelf water transport into the basin. In our simple analytical model, the enhanced northward transport of summer water and reduced northward transport of winter water are well demonstrated. The present study indicates that these basic dynamics imply that a strengthening of the surface forcing during winter in the Canada Basin could cause sea-ice reduction in the Western Arctic through the changes of underlying Pacific Summer Water.     

Spring and summer phytoplankton communities in the Chukchi and Eastern Beaufort Seas

Phytoplankton pigments and size-fractionated biomass in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas showed spatial and temporal variation during the spring and summer of 2002. Cluster analysis of pigment ratios revealed different assemblages over the shelf, slope and basin regions. In spring, phytoplankton with particle sizes greater than 5 μm, identified as diatoms and/or haptophytes, dominated over the shelf. Smaller (<5 μm) phytoplankton containing chlorophyll b, most likely prasinophytes, were more abundant over the slope and basin. Due to extensive ice cover at this time, phytoplankton experienced low irradiance, but nutrients were near maximal for the year. By summer, small prasinophytes and larger haptophytes and diatoms co-dominated in near-surface assemblages in largely ice-free waters when nitrate was mostly depleted. Deeper in the water column at 1–15% of the surface irradiance larger sized diatoms were still abundant in the upper nutricline. Phytoplankton from the shelf appeared to be advected through Barrow Canyon to the adjacent basin, explaining similar composition between the two areas in spring and summer. Off-shelf advection was much less pronounced for other slope and basin areas, which are influenced by the low-nutrient Beaufort gyre circulation, leading to a dominance of smaller prasinophytes and chlorophytes. The correlation of large-sized fucoxanthin containing phytoplankton with the higher primary production measurements shows promise for trophic status to be estimated using accessory pigment ratios.     

Atlas of Japan (East) Sea hydrographic properties in summer, 1999

Hydrographic properties from CTD and discrete bottle sample profiles covering the Japan (East) Sea in summer, 1999, are presented in vertical sections, maps at standard depths, maps on isopycnal surfaces, and as property–property distributions. This data set covers most of the Sea with the exception of the western boundary region and northern Tatar Strait, and includes nutrients, pH, alkalinity, and chlorofluorocarbons, as well as the usual temperature, salinity, and oxygen observations.     

Seasonal Variability of Near-Surface Heat Budget of Selected Oceanic Areas in the North Tropical Indian Ocean

The results obtained from an Ocean General Circulation Model (OGCM), the Modular Ocean Model 2.2, forced with the National Center for Environmental Prediction/National Center for Atmospheric Research reanalysis data, and observational data have been utilized to document the climatological seasonal cycle of the upper ocean response in the Tropical Indian Ocean. We address the various roles played by the net surface heat flux and the local and remote ocean dynamics for the seasonal variation of near-surface heat budget in the Tropical Indian Ocean. The investigation is based in seven selected boxes in the Arabian Sea, Bay of Bengal and the Equatorial Indian Ocean. The changes of basin-wide heat budget of ocean process in the Arabian Sea and the Western Equatorial Indian Ocean show an annual cycle, whereas those in the Bay of Bengal and the Eastern Equatorial Indian Ocean show a semi-annual cycle. The time tendency of heat budget in the Arabian Sea depends on both the net surface heat flux and ocean dynamics while on the other hand, that in the Bay of Bengal depends mainly on the net surface flux. However, it has been found that the changes of heat budget are very different between western and eastern regional sea areas in the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal, respectively. This difference depends on seasonal variations of the different local wind forcing and the different ocean dynamics associated with ocean eddies and Kelvin and Rossby waves in each regional sea areas. We also discuss the comparison and the connection for the seasonal variation of near-surface heat budget among their regional sea areas. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

The Deep-Water Peyssonnelia Beds from the Balearic Islands (Western Mediterranean)

Abstract. Peyssonnelia bed distribution on continental shelf bottoms of the Balearic Islands (Western Mediterranean) ranges from 40 to 90 m depth. Different species of Peyssonnelia dominate these bottoms and, according to multivariate techniques, two main assemblages have been distinguished: the Peyssonnelia rosa-marina beds and the Peyssonnelia sp. beds, together with some transition samples between Peyssonnelia and maërl beds. Erect red algae are always abundant. Although average yearly irradiance reaching these beds is only 6.4-0.3% of subsurface irradiance, the species richness averages 45 species per sample (1600 cm²) and mean biomass is 2835 g dw. m^-2. The high carbonate content of the living algae of these bottoms suggests that they are important contributors to the production of sediments in the Balearic continental shelf.     

东太平洋柱状沉积物的古气候和古环境记录

太平洋深海盆地的远洋沉积物在物质组成和来源上远较大陆边缘简单.由于远离大陆,又有海沟与周边大陆分隔,太平洋深海沉积物中通常不包含由河流水系搬运而来的悬浮物,因此从深海沉积物中提取古气候、古环境信息可以避免诸多地质因素相互叠加和干扰[1].深海远洋沉积物中的主要组分是风成陆源碎屑(包括火山碎屑)和来自上层海水的生源组分(降落到洋底的生物壳体)以及由海解作用形成的自生矿物[2],其中陆源碎屑的相对含量、粒度及矿物成分可以反映大气环流的强度及物源区的气候环境[1],生源组分的组成、相对含量和丰度以及种属含量变化则与表层海水的生产力和溶解作用有关.     

Spatial and temporal variability of heat content above the thermocline in the tropical Pacific Ocean

Abstract-Heat content of the upper layer above the 20℃ isotherm in the tropical Pacific Ocean isestimated by using the sea temperature data set with a resolution 2°latitude×5°longitude (1980～1993)for the water depths (every 10 m) from 0 m to 400 m, and its temporal and spatial variabilities are an-alyzed. (1) The temporal variability indicates that the total heat in the upper layer of the equatorial Pa-cific Ocean is charcterized by the interannual variability. The time series of the equatorial heat anomaly5 months lead that of the El Nino index at the best positive lag correlation between the two, and theformer 13 months lag behind the latter at their best negative lag correlation. Therefore the equatorialheat content can be used as a better predictor than the El Nino index for a warm or cold event. In addi-tion, it is also found that less heat anomaly in the equator corresponds to the stronger warm events inthe period (1980～1993) and much more heat was accumulated in the 4 years including 1992/1     

冲绳海槽中西部边缘区沉积物成因和沉积环境

本文根据１９９６年“中－法合作东海计划”在冲绳海槽中西部边缘区所取柱状样岩芯沉积物粒度分析资料,对该区沉积物特征进行研究。结果表明,火山沉积和富含生物的半远洋深海软泥沉积是本区的主要特征。以４８１ｃｍ为界,上、下两层沉积物截然不同,可能是沉积物的来源不同或者是水动力条件的差异。该区主要受火山活动的影响,其次是黑潮、大洋风暴     

Validation and Improvement of Satellite-Derived Surface Solar Radiation over the Northwestern Pacific Ocean

The purpose of this study is to validate and improve satellite-derived downward surface shortwave radiation (DSSR) over the northwestern Pacific Ocean using abundant in situ data. The DSSR derivation model used here assumes that the reduction of solar radiation by clouds is proportional to the product of satellite-measured albedo and a cloud attenuation coefficient. DSSR is calculated from Geostationary Meteorological Satellite-5/Visible Infrared Spin-Scan Radiometer data in 0.05° × 0.05° grids. The authors first compare the satellite DSSR derived with a cloud attenuation coefficient table determined in past research with in situ values. Although the hourly satellite DSSR agrees well with land in situ values in Japan, it has a bias of +13∼+34 W/m² over the ocean and the bias is especially large in the low latitudes. The authors then improve the coefficient table using the ocean in situ data. Usage of the new table successfully reduces the bias of the satellite DSSR over the ocean. The cloud attenuation coefficient for low-albedo cases over the ocean needs to be larger in the low latitudes than past research has indicated. Daily and hourly DSSR can be evaluated from the satellite data with RMS errors of 11–14% and 30–33%, respectively, over a wide region of the ocean by this model. It is also shown that the cloud attenuation coefficient over land needs to be smaller than over the ocean because the effect of the radiation reflected by the land surface cannot be ignored.