North Atlantic subtropical mode water formation controlled by Gulf Stream fronts
ABSTRACT The North Atlantic Ocean hosts the largest volume of global subtropical mode waters (STMWs) in the world, which serve as heat, carbon and oxygen silos in the ocean interior. STMWs are formed in the Gulf Stream region where thermal fronts are pervasive and result in feedback with the atmosph...
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croxfordunivpr:10.1093/nsr/nwad133 2023-09-05T13:21:27+02:00 North Atlantic subtropical mode water formation controlled by Gulf Stream fronts Gan, Bolan Yu, Jingjie Wu, Lixin Danabasoglu, Gokhan Small, R Justin Baker, Allison H Jia, Fan Jing, Zhao Ma, Xiaohui Yang, Haiyuan Chen, Zhaohui National Natural Science Foundation of China Science and Technology Innovation Foundation of Laoshan Laboratory National Key Research and Development Program of China Qingdao Post-Doctoral Grant Youth Innovation Promotion Association of the Chinese Academy of Sciences 2023 http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/nsr/nwad133 https://academic.oup.com/nsr/advance-article-pdf/doi/10.1093/nsr/nwad133/50796251/nwad133.pdf https://academic.oup.com/nsr/article-pdf/10/9/nwad133/51076881/nwad133.pdf en eng Oxford University Press (OUP) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ National Science Review volume 10, issue 9 ISSN 2095-5138 2053-714X Multidisciplinary journal-article 2023 croxfordunivpr https://doi.org/10.1093/nsr/nwad133 2023-08-11T09:22:28Z ABSTRACT The North Atlantic Ocean hosts the largest volume of global subtropical mode waters (STMWs) in the world, which serve as heat, carbon and oxygen silos in the ocean interior. STMWs are formed in the Gulf Stream region where thermal fronts are pervasive and result in feedback with the atmosphere. However, their roles in STMW formation have been overlooked. Using eddy-resolving global climate simulations, we find that suppressing local frontal-scale ocean-to-atmosphere (FOA) feedback leads to STMW formation being reduced almost by half. This is because FOA feedback enlarges STMW outcropping, attributable to the mixed layer deepening associated with cumulative excessive latent heat loss due to higher wind speeds and greater air-sea humidity contrast driven by the Gulf Stream fronts. Such enhanced heat loss overshadows the stronger restratification induced by vertical eddies and turbulent heat transport, making STMW colder and heavier. With more realistic representation of FOA feedback, the eddy-present/rich coupled global climate models reproduce the observed STMWs much better than the eddy-free ones. Such improvement in STMW production cannot be achieved, even with the oceanic resolution solely refined but without coupling to the overlying atmosphere in oceanic general circulation models. Our findings highlight the need to resolve FOA feedback to ameliorate the common severe underestimation of STMW and associated heat and carbon uptakes in earth system models. Article in Journal/Newspaper North Atlantic Oxford University Press (via Crossref) National Science Review |
institution |
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Oxford University Press (via Crossref) |
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English |
topic |
Multidisciplinary |
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Multidisciplinary Gan, Bolan Yu, Jingjie Wu, Lixin Danabasoglu, Gokhan Small, R Justin Baker, Allison H Jia, Fan Jing, Zhao Ma, Xiaohui Yang, Haiyuan Chen, Zhaohui North Atlantic subtropical mode water formation controlled by Gulf Stream fronts |
topic_facet |
Multidisciplinary |
description |
ABSTRACT The North Atlantic Ocean hosts the largest volume of global subtropical mode waters (STMWs) in the world, which serve as heat, carbon and oxygen silos in the ocean interior. STMWs are formed in the Gulf Stream region where thermal fronts are pervasive and result in feedback with the atmosphere. However, their roles in STMW formation have been overlooked. Using eddy-resolving global climate simulations, we find that suppressing local frontal-scale ocean-to-atmosphere (FOA) feedback leads to STMW formation being reduced almost by half. This is because FOA feedback enlarges STMW outcropping, attributable to the mixed layer deepening associated with cumulative excessive latent heat loss due to higher wind speeds and greater air-sea humidity contrast driven by the Gulf Stream fronts. Such enhanced heat loss overshadows the stronger restratification induced by vertical eddies and turbulent heat transport, making STMW colder and heavier. With more realistic representation of FOA feedback, the eddy-present/rich coupled global climate models reproduce the observed STMWs much better than the eddy-free ones. Such improvement in STMW production cannot be achieved, even with the oceanic resolution solely refined but without coupling to the overlying atmosphere in oceanic general circulation models. Our findings highlight the need to resolve FOA feedback to ameliorate the common severe underestimation of STMW and associated heat and carbon uptakes in earth system models. |
author2 |
National Natural Science Foundation of China Science and Technology Innovation Foundation of Laoshan Laboratory National Key Research and Development Program of China Qingdao Post-Doctoral Grant Youth Innovation Promotion Association of the Chinese Academy of Sciences |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Gan, Bolan Yu, Jingjie Wu, Lixin Danabasoglu, Gokhan Small, R Justin Baker, Allison H Jia, Fan Jing, Zhao Ma, Xiaohui Yang, Haiyuan Chen, Zhaohui |
author_facet |
Gan, Bolan Yu, Jingjie Wu, Lixin Danabasoglu, Gokhan Small, R Justin Baker, Allison H Jia, Fan Jing, Zhao Ma, Xiaohui Yang, Haiyuan Chen, Zhaohui |
author_sort |
Gan, Bolan |
title |
North Atlantic subtropical mode water formation controlled by Gulf Stream fronts |
title_short |
North Atlantic subtropical mode water formation controlled by Gulf Stream fronts |
title_full |
North Atlantic subtropical mode water formation controlled by Gulf Stream fronts |
title_fullStr |
North Atlantic subtropical mode water formation controlled by Gulf Stream fronts |
title_full_unstemmed |
North Atlantic subtropical mode water formation controlled by Gulf Stream fronts |
title_sort |
north atlantic subtropical mode water formation controlled by gulf stream fronts |
publisher |
Oxford University Press (OUP) |
publishDate |
2023 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/nsr/nwad133 https://academic.oup.com/nsr/advance-article-pdf/doi/10.1093/nsr/nwad133/50796251/nwad133.pdf https://academic.oup.com/nsr/article-pdf/10/9/nwad133/51076881/nwad133.pdf |
genre |
North Atlantic |
genre_facet |
North Atlantic |
op_source |
National Science Review volume 10, issue 9 ISSN 2095-5138 2053-714X |
op_rights |
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1093/nsr/nwad133 |
container_title |
National Science Review |
_version_ |
1776202054421708800 |