Wave and Meso-Scale Eddy Climate in the Arctic Ocean
Under global climate change, the characteristics of oceanic dynamics are gradually beginning to change due to melting sea ice. This study focused on inter-annual variation in waves and mesoscale eddies (radius > 40 km) in the Arctic Ocean from 1993 to 2021. The waves were simulated by a numerical...
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ftmdpi:oai:mdpi.com:/2073-4433/14/6/911/ 2023-08-20T04:03:55+02:00 Wave and Meso-Scale Eddy Climate in the Arctic Ocean Guojing Xing Wei Shen Meng Wei Huan Li Weizeng Shao agris 2023-05-23 application/pdf https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos14060911 EN eng Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute Climatology https://dx.doi.org/10.3390/atmos14060911 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Atmosphere; Volume 14; Issue 6; Pages: 911 wave eddy WAVEWATCH-III Arctic ocean Text 2023 ftmdpi https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos14060911 2023-08-01T10:11:23Z Under global climate change, the characteristics of oceanic dynamics are gradually beginning to change due to melting sea ice. This study focused on inter-annual variation in waves and mesoscale eddies (radius > 40 km) in the Arctic Ocean from 1993 to 2021. The waves were simulated by a numerical wave model, WAVEWATCH-III (WW3), which included a parameterization of ice–wave interaction. The long-term wind data were from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) reanalysis (ERA-5), and current and sea level data from the HYbrid Coordinate Ocean Model (HYCOM)were used as the forcing fields. The simulated significant wave heights (SWHs) were validated against the 2012 measurements from the Jason-2 altimeter, yielding a 0.55 m root mean square error (RMSE) with a 0.95 correlation (COR). The seasonal variation in WW3-simulated SWH from 2021 to 2022 showed that the SWH was the lowest in summer (July and August 2021) and highest in winter (November 2021 to April 2022). This result indicates that parts of the Arctic could become navigable in summer. The mesoscale eddies were identified using a daily-averaged sea level anomalies (SLA) product with a spatial resolution of a 0.25° grid for 1993−2021. We found that the activity intensity (EKE) and radius of mesoscale eddies in the spatial distribution behaved in opposing ways. The analysis of seasonal variation showed that the increase in eddy activity could lead to wave growth. The amplitude of SWH peaks was reduced when the Arctic Oscillation Index (AOI) was <−1.0 and increased when the AOI was >0.5, especially in the case of swells. The amplitude of SWH oscillation was low, and the EKE and radius of eddies were relatively small. Although the radius and EKE of eddies were almost similar to the AOI, the waves also influenced the eddies. Text Arctic Arctic Ocean Climate change Sea ice MDPI Open Access Publishing Arctic Arctic Ocean Atmosphere 14 6 911 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
MDPI Open Access Publishing |
op_collection_id |
ftmdpi |
language |
English |
topic |
wave eddy WAVEWATCH-III Arctic ocean |
spellingShingle |
wave eddy WAVEWATCH-III Arctic ocean Guojing Xing Wei Shen Meng Wei Huan Li Weizeng Shao Wave and Meso-Scale Eddy Climate in the Arctic Ocean |
topic_facet |
wave eddy WAVEWATCH-III Arctic ocean |
description |
Under global climate change, the characteristics of oceanic dynamics are gradually beginning to change due to melting sea ice. This study focused on inter-annual variation in waves and mesoscale eddies (radius > 40 km) in the Arctic Ocean from 1993 to 2021. The waves were simulated by a numerical wave model, WAVEWATCH-III (WW3), which included a parameterization of ice–wave interaction. The long-term wind data were from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) reanalysis (ERA-5), and current and sea level data from the HYbrid Coordinate Ocean Model (HYCOM)were used as the forcing fields. The simulated significant wave heights (SWHs) were validated against the 2012 measurements from the Jason-2 altimeter, yielding a 0.55 m root mean square error (RMSE) with a 0.95 correlation (COR). The seasonal variation in WW3-simulated SWH from 2021 to 2022 showed that the SWH was the lowest in summer (July and August 2021) and highest in winter (November 2021 to April 2022). This result indicates that parts of the Arctic could become navigable in summer. The mesoscale eddies were identified using a daily-averaged sea level anomalies (SLA) product with a spatial resolution of a 0.25° grid for 1993−2021. We found that the activity intensity (EKE) and radius of mesoscale eddies in the spatial distribution behaved in opposing ways. The analysis of seasonal variation showed that the increase in eddy activity could lead to wave growth. The amplitude of SWH peaks was reduced when the Arctic Oscillation Index (AOI) was <−1.0 and increased when the AOI was >0.5, especially in the case of swells. The amplitude of SWH oscillation was low, and the EKE and radius of eddies were relatively small. Although the radius and EKE of eddies were almost similar to the AOI, the waves also influenced the eddies. |
format |
Text |
author |
Guojing Xing Wei Shen Meng Wei Huan Li Weizeng Shao |
author_facet |
Guojing Xing Wei Shen Meng Wei Huan Li Weizeng Shao |
author_sort |
Guojing Xing |
title |
Wave and Meso-Scale Eddy Climate in the Arctic Ocean |
title_short |
Wave and Meso-Scale Eddy Climate in the Arctic Ocean |
title_full |
Wave and Meso-Scale Eddy Climate in the Arctic Ocean |
title_fullStr |
Wave and Meso-Scale Eddy Climate in the Arctic Ocean |
title_full_unstemmed |
Wave and Meso-Scale Eddy Climate in the Arctic Ocean |
title_sort |
wave and meso-scale eddy climate in the arctic ocean |
publisher |
Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute |
publishDate |
2023 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos14060911 |
op_coverage |
agris |
geographic |
Arctic Arctic Ocean |
geographic_facet |
Arctic Arctic Ocean |
genre |
Arctic Arctic Ocean Climate change Sea ice |
genre_facet |
Arctic Arctic Ocean Climate change Sea ice |
op_source |
Atmosphere; Volume 14; Issue 6; Pages: 911 |
op_relation |
Climatology https://dx.doi.org/10.3390/atmos14060911 |
op_rights |
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos14060911 |
container_title |
Atmosphere |
container_volume |
14 |
container_issue |
6 |
container_start_page |
911 |
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1774714343030521856 |