Decadal freshening of the Antarctic Bottom Water exported from the Weddell Sea

• Published in: Journal of Climate
• Main Authors: Jullion, Loïc, Naveira Garabato, Alberto C., Meredith, Michael P., Holland, Paul, H., Courtois, Peggy, King, Brian A.
• Other Authors: Institut méditerranéen d'océanologie (MIO), Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)-Aix Marseille Université (AMU)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Université de Toulon (UTLN)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Nathional Oceanography Centre, University of Southampton, British Antarctic Survey (BAS), Natural Environment Research Council (NERC)
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2013
• Subjects: [SDU.OCEAN]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Ocean; Atmosphere; Antarc*; Antarctic; Antarctic Peninsula; Antarctica; Ice Shelves; Sea ice; Southern Ocean; Weddell Sea; West Antarctica
• Online Access: https://hal.science/hal-01255767; https://hal.science/hal-01255767/document; https://hal.science/hal-01255767/file/larsen_jclim_submitted.pdf; https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-12-00765.1

International audience Recent decadal changes in Southern Hemisphere climate have driven strong responses from the cryo- sphere. Concurrently, there has been a marked freshening of the shelf and bottom waters across a wide sector of the Southern Ocean, hypothesized to be caused by accelerated glacial melt in response to a greater flux of warm waters from the Antarctic Circumpolar Current onto the shelves of West Antarctica. However, the circumpolar pattern of changes has been incomplete: no decadal freshening in the deep layers of the Atlantic sector has been observed. In this study, the authors document a significant freshening of the Antarctic Bottom Water exported from the Weddell Sea, which is the source for the abyssal layer of the Atlantic overturning circulation, and trace its possible origin to atmospheric-forced changes in the ice shelves and sea ice on the eastern flank of the Antarctic Peninsula that include an anthropogenic component. These findings suggest that the expansive and relatively cool Weddell gyre does not insulate the bottom water formation regions in the Atlantic sector from the ongoing changes in climatic forcing over the Antarctic region.