Modeling of the bottom water flow through the Romanche Fracture Zone with a primitive equation model—Part I: Dynamics

• Published in: Journal of Marine Research
• Main Authors: Ferron, B., Mercier, H., Tréguier, Anne-Marie
• Other Authors: Laboratoire de physique des océans (LPO), Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)-Institut Français de Recherche pour l'Exploitation de la Mer (IFREMER)-Université de Brest (UBO)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2000
• Subjects: [SDU.STU.OC]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences/Oceanography; Antarctic; The Antarctic; Antarc*
• Online Access: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00267670; https://doi.org/10.1357/002224000763485728

International audience This paper investigates the dynamics of the Antarctic Bottom Water (AABW) flow through the Romanche Fracture Zone (RFZ) in a primitive equation model with a high horizontal and vertical resolution. Two examples of flows over simple bathymetries show that a reduced gravity model captures the essential dynamics of the primitive equation model. The reduced gravity model is then used as a tool to identify what are the bathymetric structures (sills, narrows) that mostly constrain theAABW flow through the RFZ. When only these structures are represented in the primitive equation model, the AABW flow is shown to be coherent with observations (transports, density and velocity structures)