Eddy‐Induced Dispersion of Sea Ice Floes at the Marginal Ice Zone

Abstract Ocean heat exchanges at the marginal ice zone (MIZ) play an important role in melting sea ice. Mixed‐layer eddies transport heat and ice floes across the MIZ, facilitating the pack's access to warm waters. This study explores these frontal dynamics using disk‐shaped floes coupled to an...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Geophysical Research Letters
Main Authors: Mukund Gupta, Emma Gürcan, Andrew F. Thompson
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: Wiley 2024
Subjects:
sea ice
oceanography
polar climate
eddies
submesoscale
heat transport
Geophysics. Cosmic physics
QC801-809
Sea ice
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.1029/2023GL105656
https://doaj.org/article/ca7d782d4f2c45bd983ef86eb3a1cb5c
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Summary:Abstract Ocean heat exchanges at the marginal ice zone (MIZ) play an important role in melting sea ice. Mixed‐layer eddies transport heat and ice floes across the MIZ, facilitating the pack's access to warm waters. This study explores these frontal dynamics using disk‐shaped floes coupled to an upper‐ocean model simulating the sea ice edge. Numerical experiments reveal that small floes respond more strongly to fine‐scale ocean currents, which favors higher dispersion rates and weakens sea ice drag onto the underlying ocean. Floes with radii smaller than resolved turbulent filaments (∼2–4 km) result in a wider and more energetic MIZ, by a factor of 70% each, compared to larger floes. We hypothesize that this floe size dependency may affect sea ice break‐up by controlling oceanic energy propagation into the MIZ and modulate the sea ice pack's melt rate by regulating lateral heat transport toward the sea ice cover.

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