The Greenland Sea Upper Ocean Variability As Simulated By Models

• Main Authors: S. Hakkinen, F. Dupont, M. Karcher, F. Kauker, D. Worthen, J. Zhang
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Arctic; Arctic Ocean; Greenland; Greenland Sea
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.543.650; http://efdl.cims.nyu.edu/project_aomip/publications/jgr_2006/hakkinen_greenland.pdf

Upper ocean conditions in the Greenland Sea are investigated for detecting preconditioning of the water column for deep convection and how these conditions are simulated in the models. Observations indicate that periods of intense deep-water formation were also associated with dense upper ocean water masses, hence we focus on the upper ocean hydrography. We chose to analyze properties at 200m which reside below summer mixed layer and carry the deep mixing signal from winter. Numerical simulations from 4 different models are analyzed, all of which have been subjected to forcing as specified by the Arctic Ocean Model Intercomparison Project (AOMIP). Models have varying degree of success in simulating the upper ocean properties such as very saline and dense water masses in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s as found in the observations. However, there are several characteristics apparent in the observations which are not captured by the models such as the topographic imprint in the hydrographic variability. The primary reasons for discrepancies between the models (and observations) are related to the advection and mixing of water masses: First, the deficiencies arise from the upstream hydrographic properties (and the transport) which propagate into the