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Estimation of the time series of the meridional heat transport across 15°N in the P acific O cean from A rgo and satellite data
Author(s) -
Yang Tingting,
Xu Yongsheng
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
journal of geophysical research: oceans
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2169-9291
pISSN - 2169-9275
DOI - 10.1002/2015jc010752
Subject(s) - argo , geostrophic wind , zonal and meridional , environmental science , scatterometer , altimeter , satellite , series (stratigraphy) , climatology , flux (metallurgy) , annual cycle , atmospheric sciences , meteorology , geology , chemistry , geography , physics , paleontology , astronomy , organic chemistry
The time series of the net meridional heat transport (MHT) at 15°N in the Pacific Ocean from 2003 to 2012 is estimated by combining the Argo profiles with the satellite altimeter and scatterometer data. The estimate is validated against the climatological ocean data and the ECCO2 products, and is demonstrated to be reasonable. The MHT has a high degree of variability with a temporal mean of 0.70 ± 0.31 PW, which is concentrated in the upper 800 dbar. The time series of the MHT and Ekman temperature transport have a significant annual cycle which peaks near April and December, whereas the time series of the geostrophic temperature transport have a subannual cycle. The results are consistent with previous estimates and lower than the ECCO2 estimate, which may mainly be caused by the different data sources and processings. The correlation between the air‐sea flux and MHT is 0.50 with a 3 month delay. This report describes the first such attempt at a continuous transport of heat at 15°N in the Pacific Ocean from in situ observations.