2007c), Optimization of an observing system design for the North Atlantic meridional overturning circulation, Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology, in the press, available at: http://www.geosc.psu.edu/~kkeller/publications.html

• Main Authors: Johanna Baehr, David Mcinerney, Klaus Keller, Jochem Marotzke
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: North Atlantic
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.76.4452; http://www.geosc.psu.edu/~kkeller/Baehr_et_al_jaot_07.pdf

Three methods are analyzed for the design of ocean observing systems to monitor the meridional overturning circulation (MOC) in the North Atlantic. Specifically, a continuous monitoring array to monitor the MOC at 1000 m at different lati-tudes is ‘deployed ’ into a numerical model. We compare array design methods guided by (i) physical intuition (heuristic array design), (ii) sequential optimiza-tion, and (iii) global optimization. Global optimization technique can recover the true global solution for the analyzed array design, while gradient based optimiza-tion would be prone to misconverge. Both global optimization and heuristic array design yield considerably improved results over sequential array design. Global optimization always outperforms the heuristic array design in terms of minimizing the root mean square error. However, whether the results are physically meaning-ful is not guaranteed; the apparent success might merely represent a solution in which misfits compensate each other accidentally. Testing the solution gained from global optimization in an independent data set can provide crucial informa-tion about the solution’s robustness. 1.