Recent advances in study of oceanic vortex

In this paper, the recent advances in the study of oceanic vortex are outlined. Firstly, the previous studies on oceanic vortex are reviewed. Secondly, some prominent features of oceanic vortex in the Gulf Stream, the Kuroshio, the South China Sea and the Japan Sea regions are depicted based upon the observations and numerical modeling results. Generally, the lifetime of these oceanic vortices ranges from several weeks to several months, and their horizontal scales vary from tens of kilometers to hundreds of kilometers. Their vertical scales are on the order of thousands of meters. Finally, some theoretical studies, mainly on the splitting of a cyclonic vortex and the merging of anticyclonic vortices, are introduced.