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Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics
UCLA
Abstract-
The field measurements recently ended for the World Ocean
Circulation Experiment (WOCE). This was an enormous undertaking
involving many satellites, many tens of ships, and many hundreds of
autonomous platforms overseen by hundreds of scientists from many
nations over a period of nearly two decades. While physical
oceanographers took pride in these conspicuous expenditures of effort
and funds, they now struggle with the resulting data
abundance---albeit still with significant sampling sparsity for many
relevant features---in order to distill the essential lessons about
the controlling processes and dynamical balances for the general
circulation. It is thus timely to summarize for a broader community
of fluid dynamicists what these essential lessons are.
The discussion will be set in the context of historically
prevailing ideas about oceanic circulation dynamics to consider how
these evolved during the WOCE era. The following topics will be
addressed:
* Horizontal Mass Transport: Adjustments to Wind-Driven Sverdrup
Balance
* Pycnocline Circulation: Planetary Geostrophy and Subduction
* Abyssal Thermohaline Circulation: Connecting the Vertical Motions in
Stommel-Arons Balance
* Surface Circulation: Mixed and Ekman Layers, Surface-Wave Effects,
and Climate Feedbacks
* Mesoscale Eddies: Quasi-Adiabatic Mixing and Lagrangian-Mean Advection
* Diapycnal Microscale Mixing: Topographic Enhancements of Breaking
Internal Waves
* Overflows: Renewal of Abyssal Water Masses by Entraining Gravity Currents
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