Improving the thermocline calculation over the global ocean
According to the typical thermal structure of the ocean, the water column can be divided into three layers: the mixing layer, the thermocline and the deep layer. In this study, we provide a new methodology, based on a function adjustment on the temperature profile, to locate the minimum and maximum...
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ftnonlinearchiv:oai:noa.gwlb.de:cop_mods_00062441 2023-05-15T17:34:29+02:00 Improving the thermocline calculation over the global ocean Romero, Emmanuel Tenorio-Fernandez, Leonardo Portela, Esther Montes-Aréchiga, Jorge Sánchez-Velasco, Laura 2022-08 electronic https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2022-788 https://noa.gwlb.de/receive/cop_mods_00062441 https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/egusphere-2022-788/egusphere-2022-788.pdf eng eng Copernicus Publications https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2022-788 https://noa.gwlb.de/receive/cop_mods_00062441 https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/egusphere-2022-788/egusphere-2022-788.pdf https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ uneingeschränkt info:eu-repo/semantics/restrictedAccess CC-BY article Verlagsveröffentlichung article Text doc-type:article 2022 ftnonlinearchiv https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2022-788 2022-09-04T23:11:57Z According to the typical thermal structure of the ocean, the water column can be divided into three layers: the mixing layer, the thermocline and the deep layer. In this study, we provide a new methodology, based on a function adjustment on the temperature profile, to locate the minimum and maximum depths of the thermocline, and therefore its thickness, to separate the water column into layers. We first validated our methodology by comparing the mixed layer depth obtained with the method proposed here with that of two previous studies. Since we found a very good agreement between the three methods we used the function adjustment to compute the monthly climatologies of the mixed layer depth, the maximum depth of the thermocline and the thermocline thickness, throughout the ocean. We also provide an assessment of the regions of the ocean where our adjustment is valid, and consequently the regions where the thermal structure of the ocean follows the three-layer structure. However, there are ocean regions where the water column cannot be separated into three layers due to the dynamic processes that alter it and the major contribution of salinity to stratification. This assessment highlights the limitations of the existing methods to accurately determine the mixed layer depth and the thermocline in oceanic regions that are particularly turbulent as the Southern Ocean and the northern North Atlantic, among others. The method proposed here has shown to be robust and easy to apply, and it can be used in both local and global studies. Article in Journal/Newspaper North Atlantic Southern Ocean Niedersächsisches Online-Archiv NOA Southern Ocean |
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Niedersächsisches Online-Archiv NOA |
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ftnonlinearchiv |
language |
English |
topic |
article Verlagsveröffentlichung |
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article Verlagsveröffentlichung Romero, Emmanuel Tenorio-Fernandez, Leonardo Portela, Esther Montes-Aréchiga, Jorge Sánchez-Velasco, Laura Improving the thermocline calculation over the global ocean |
topic_facet |
article Verlagsveröffentlichung |
description |
According to the typical thermal structure of the ocean, the water column can be divided into three layers: the mixing layer, the thermocline and the deep layer. In this study, we provide a new methodology, based on a function adjustment on the temperature profile, to locate the minimum and maximum depths of the thermocline, and therefore its thickness, to separate the water column into layers. We first validated our methodology by comparing the mixed layer depth obtained with the method proposed here with that of two previous studies. Since we found a very good agreement between the three methods we used the function adjustment to compute the monthly climatologies of the mixed layer depth, the maximum depth of the thermocline and the thermocline thickness, throughout the ocean. We also provide an assessment of the regions of the ocean where our adjustment is valid, and consequently the regions where the thermal structure of the ocean follows the three-layer structure. However, there are ocean regions where the water column cannot be separated into three layers due to the dynamic processes that alter it and the major contribution of salinity to stratification. This assessment highlights the limitations of the existing methods to accurately determine the mixed layer depth and the thermocline in oceanic regions that are particularly turbulent as the Southern Ocean and the northern North Atlantic, among others. The method proposed here has shown to be robust and easy to apply, and it can be used in both local and global studies. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Romero, Emmanuel Tenorio-Fernandez, Leonardo Portela, Esther Montes-Aréchiga, Jorge Sánchez-Velasco, Laura |
author_facet |
Romero, Emmanuel Tenorio-Fernandez, Leonardo Portela, Esther Montes-Aréchiga, Jorge Sánchez-Velasco, Laura |
author_sort |
Romero, Emmanuel |
title |
Improving the thermocline calculation over the global ocean |
title_short |
Improving the thermocline calculation over the global ocean |
title_full |
Improving the thermocline calculation over the global ocean |
title_fullStr |
Improving the thermocline calculation over the global ocean |
title_full_unstemmed |
Improving the thermocline calculation over the global ocean |
title_sort |
improving the thermocline calculation over the global ocean |
publisher |
Copernicus Publications |
publishDate |
2022 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2022-788 https://noa.gwlb.de/receive/cop_mods_00062441 https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/egusphere-2022-788/egusphere-2022-788.pdf |
geographic |
Southern Ocean |
geographic_facet |
Southern Ocean |
genre |
North Atlantic Southern Ocean |
genre_facet |
North Atlantic Southern Ocean |
op_relation |
https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2022-788 https://noa.gwlb.de/receive/cop_mods_00062441 https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/egusphere-2022-788/egusphere-2022-788.pdf |
op_rights |
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ uneingeschränkt info:eu-repo/semantics/restrictedAccess |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2022-788 |
_version_ |
1766133342743298048 |