Why is there net surface heating over the Antarctic Circumpolar Current?
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Author(s)
Czaja, Arnaud
Marshall, John C
Date Issued
March 2015
Journal
Ocean Dynamics
Publisher
Springer Berlin Heidelberg
Citation
Czaja, Arnaud, and John Marshall. “Why Is There Net Surface Heating over the Antarctic Circumpolar Current?” Ocean Dynamics 65, no. 5 (March 31, 2015): 751–760.
Version
Author's final manuscript
Abstract
Using a combination of atmospheric reanalysis data, climate model outputs and a simple model, key mechanisms controlling net surface heating over the Southern Ocean are identified. All data sources used suggest that, in a streamline-averaged view, net surface heating over the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) is a result of net accumulation of solar radiation rather than a result of heat gain through turbulent fluxes (the latter systematically cool the upper ocean). It is proposed that the fraction of this net radiative heat gain realized as net ACC heating is set by two factors. First, the sea surface temperature at the southern edge of the ACC. Second, the relative strength of the negative heatflux feedbacks associated with evaporation at the sea surface and advection of heat by the residual flow in the oceanic mixed layer. A large advective feedback and a weak evaporative feedback maximize net ACC heating. It is shown that the present Southern Ocean and its circumpolar current are in this heating regime.
Description
This article is part of the Topical Collection on Atmosphere and
Ocean Dynamics: A Scientific Workshop to Celebrate Professor
Dr. Richard Greatbatch’s 60th Birthday, Liverpool, UK, 10-11
April 2014.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences
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Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10236-015-0830-1
