A description of the hydrography between Cape Town and Antarctica along the GoodHope Transect between 2004-2012
The Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) within the Southern Ocean (SO) is the primary driver for global interoceanic exchanges. These exchanges form the foundation for the Meridional Overturning Circulation (MOC), a deep density driven circulation, which extends throughout the global oceans. The fro...
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University of Cape Town
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Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/11427/15495 https://open.uct.ac.za/bitstream/11427/15495/1/thesis_sci_2015_jcbchr007-thesis.pdf |
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ftunivcapetownir:oai:localhost:11427/15495 2023-05-15T13:42:14+02:00 A description of the hydrography between Cape Town and Antarctica along the GoodHope Transect between 2004-2012 Jacobs, Christopher Richard Ansorge, Isabelle Jane 2015 application/pdf http://hdl.handle.net/11427/15495 https://open.uct.ac.za/bitstream/11427/15495/1/thesis_sci_2015_jcbchr007-thesis.pdf eng eng University of Cape Town Faculty of Science Department of Oceanography http://hdl.handle.net/11427/15495 https://open.uct.ac.za/bitstream/11427/15495/1/thesis_sci_2015_jcbchr007-thesis.pdf Oceanography Master Thesis Masters MSc 2015 ftunivcapetownir 2022-09-13T05:47:49Z The Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) within the Southern Ocean (SO) is the primary driver for global interoceanic exchanges. These exchanges form the foundation for the Meridional Overturning Circulation (MOC), a deep density driven circulation, which extends throughout the global oceans. The fronts of the ACC, consisting of several branches, separate zones of distinct water masses, thus identifying the location of the fronts and understanding their dynamics is of global importance. The GoodHope programme, is a repeat annual transect between South Africa and Antarctica, monitoring the exchanges within the Southeast Atlantic sector of the Southern Ocean. This is achieved through high resolution Expendable Bathythermograph (XBT) sampling. In this study XBT data over an eight year period (2004 – 2012) were investigated and analysed. One aim is to illustrate the variability of the fronts associated with the ACC using in-situ data from 21 transects during this eight year period. The Sub-tropical Front (STF) and Northern branch of the Sub-Antarctic Front (SAF-N) are seen to be the most variable with frontal latitudinal shifts ranging from 2-4° and 1-2° respectively. One cause of this high variability is the interaction of mesoscale features, particularly in the form of eddies and Agulhas rings. The southernmost fronts of the ACC, namely the Southern Antarctic Circumpolar front(sACCf), consisting of a Northern and Southern branch of the sACCf (sACCf-N and sACCf-S) and Southern Boundary (SBdy), also display high variability due to seasonality brought on by ice melt. The central fronts of the ACC, the Middle and Southern branches of the SAF (M-SAF and S-SAF)and Northern, Middle and Southern branches of the Polar Front (PF-N, PF-M and PF-S) remain throughout the eight year observations fairly constant, with shifts observed to be less than 1° of latitude. Grouping the Good Hope transects into austral summer periods, illustrates the di-pentadal nature of the STF, whereby the shifts are in response to mesoscale ... Master Thesis Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica Southern Ocean University of Cape Town: OpenUCT Antarctic Austral Southern Ocean The Antarctic |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
University of Cape Town: OpenUCT |
op_collection_id |
ftunivcapetownir |
language |
English |
topic |
Oceanography |
spellingShingle |
Oceanography Jacobs, Christopher Richard A description of the hydrography between Cape Town and Antarctica along the GoodHope Transect between 2004-2012 |
topic_facet |
Oceanography |
description |
The Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) within the Southern Ocean (SO) is the primary driver for global interoceanic exchanges. These exchanges form the foundation for the Meridional Overturning Circulation (MOC), a deep density driven circulation, which extends throughout the global oceans. The fronts of the ACC, consisting of several branches, separate zones of distinct water masses, thus identifying the location of the fronts and understanding their dynamics is of global importance. The GoodHope programme, is a repeat annual transect between South Africa and Antarctica, monitoring the exchanges within the Southeast Atlantic sector of the Southern Ocean. This is achieved through high resolution Expendable Bathythermograph (XBT) sampling. In this study XBT data over an eight year period (2004 – 2012) were investigated and analysed. One aim is to illustrate the variability of the fronts associated with the ACC using in-situ data from 21 transects during this eight year period. The Sub-tropical Front (STF) and Northern branch of the Sub-Antarctic Front (SAF-N) are seen to be the most variable with frontal latitudinal shifts ranging from 2-4° and 1-2° respectively. One cause of this high variability is the interaction of mesoscale features, particularly in the form of eddies and Agulhas rings. The southernmost fronts of the ACC, namely the Southern Antarctic Circumpolar front(sACCf), consisting of a Northern and Southern branch of the sACCf (sACCf-N and sACCf-S) and Southern Boundary (SBdy), also display high variability due to seasonality brought on by ice melt. The central fronts of the ACC, the Middle and Southern branches of the SAF (M-SAF and S-SAF)and Northern, Middle and Southern branches of the Polar Front (PF-N, PF-M and PF-S) remain throughout the eight year observations fairly constant, with shifts observed to be less than 1° of latitude. Grouping the Good Hope transects into austral summer periods, illustrates the di-pentadal nature of the STF, whereby the shifts are in response to mesoscale ... |
author2 |
Ansorge, Isabelle Jane |
format |
Master Thesis |
author |
Jacobs, Christopher Richard |
author_facet |
Jacobs, Christopher Richard |
author_sort |
Jacobs, Christopher Richard |
title |
A description of the hydrography between Cape Town and Antarctica along the GoodHope Transect between 2004-2012 |
title_short |
A description of the hydrography between Cape Town and Antarctica along the GoodHope Transect between 2004-2012 |
title_full |
A description of the hydrography between Cape Town and Antarctica along the GoodHope Transect between 2004-2012 |
title_fullStr |
A description of the hydrography between Cape Town and Antarctica along the GoodHope Transect between 2004-2012 |
title_full_unstemmed |
A description of the hydrography between Cape Town and Antarctica along the GoodHope Transect between 2004-2012 |
title_sort |
description of the hydrography between cape town and antarctica along the goodhope transect between 2004-2012 |
publisher |
University of Cape Town |
publishDate |
2015 |
url |
http://hdl.handle.net/11427/15495 https://open.uct.ac.za/bitstream/11427/15495/1/thesis_sci_2015_jcbchr007-thesis.pdf |
geographic |
Antarctic Austral Southern Ocean The Antarctic |
geographic_facet |
Antarctic Austral Southern Ocean The Antarctic |
genre |
Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica Southern Ocean |
genre_facet |
Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica Southern Ocean |
op_relation |
http://hdl.handle.net/11427/15495 https://open.uct.ac.za/bitstream/11427/15495/1/thesis_sci_2015_jcbchr007-thesis.pdf |
_version_ |
1766165626027507712 |