Towards the Upper-Ocean Unbalanced Submesoscale Motions in the Oleander Observations
Abstract
Oceanic submesoscale dynamics with horizontal scales Oleander observations in the Gulf Stream region provide an opportunity to quantify these processes separately. Here in this study, the role of USMs in the divergence is emphasized, which has confounded the wave–vortex decomposition of wintertime data in previous analyses. We also adopt the vertical filtering approach to identify the USMs by applying a high-pass filter to the vertical scales, as USMs are characterized by smaller vertical scales. This approach is tested with submesoscale-permitting model data to confirm its effectiveness in filtering the submesoscale velocity perturbations, before being applied to the compiled velocity data of the Oleander dataset (years 2005–18). The results show that the averaged submesoscale eddy kinetic energy by USMs can reach ∼1 × 10−3 m2 s−2 at z = −30 m in winter, much stronger than found in other seasons. Importantly, this study exemplifies the possibility of obtaining USMs from existing ADCP observations and reveals the seasonal dynamical regimes for the submesoscales.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Pub Defense Publication
- Publication Date
- Apr 01, 2023
- Source ID
- 10.1175/jpo-d-22-0134.1
Entities
People
- Baylor Fox-Kemper
- Haijin Cao
- Xiangzhou Song
- Yuyi Liu
- Zhiyou Jing
Organizations
- Brown University
- Chinese Academy of Sciences
- Hohai University
- National Natural Science Foundation of China
- Office of Naval Research Global