| Summary: | [eng] Wind generated waves are crucial to transfer energy and momentum from the atmosphere to the sea surface, redistributing and transporting such energy to remote areas of the ocean. Waves induce ventilation in the ocean upper layer, enhancing vertical mixing and producing vertical transport of biogeochemical tracers. When waves reach coastal areas they dissipate energy through viscous damping at the bottom and eventually by breaking, resulting in morphological changes of the bathymetry, sediment transport and erosion. The general objective of this Thesis is to perform a characterization of spatiotemporal variability of surface ocean waves, and to study their effect on the dynamics at the upper layers and at a coastal system. In particular, we analyze the large scale variability of the extreme wave climate in the Mediterranean Sea and the North Atlantic Ocean. We compute the monthly extreme waves analyzing their inter-annual variability. Then, at regional scale, we study the regional impact of the wind and wave induced velocity on the total surface dynamics at different sub-regions of the Mediterranean Sea from the Eulerian and Lagrangian standpoints. Finally, at coastal scale, the effects of extreme waves from storm groups on the sediment transport is assessed based on a multi-system approach combining remote and in situ data with numerical techniques. Seasonal signal accounts for 50% of the extreme wave height variability in the North Atlantic Ocean and up to 70% in some areas of the Mediterranean Sea. For the winter season, the North Atlantic Oscillation and the Scandinavian modes are the dominant large-scale atmospheric modes of variability that modulate extreme waves in the North Atlantic Ocean; and to a lesser extent, the East Atlantic Oscillation also controls extreme waves in the central part of the basin. In the Mediterranean Sea, the negative phase of East Atlantic Oscillation dominates the variability of extreme waves during winter season. At regional scale, ageostrophic currents substantially ...
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