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Extremely strong thermohaline sources/sinks generated by diagnostic initialization
Author(s) -
Chu Peter C.,
Lan Jian
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/2002gl016525
Subject(s) - initialization , thermohaline circulation , sink (geography) , salinity , environmental science , climatology , temperature salinity diagrams , meteorology , geology , physics , oceanography , computer science , geography , cartography , programming language
One difficulty for ocean modeling is the lack of velocity data for specifying the initial condition. Diagnostic initialization is widely used; it integrates the model from known temperature ( T c ) and salinity ( S c ) and zero velocity fields while holding ( T c , S c ) unchanged. After a period (around 30 days) of the diagnostic run, the velocity field ( V c ) is established, and ( T c , S c , V c ) fields are then treated as the initial conditions for the prognostic numerical modeling. During the diagnostic initialization period, the heat and salt ‘source/sink’ terms are generated at each time step. Maximum time rates of absolute change of the monthly mean T , S (0.1°/day, 0.1 ppt/day) are taken as the standard measures to identify the strength of the thermohaline ‘sources/sinks’. Twenty four times of the standard measures (0.1°/hr, 0.1 ppt/hr) represent strong ‘sources/sinks’. Ten times of the strong ‘sources/sinks’ (1°/hr, 1 ppt/hr) represent extremely strong ‘sources/sinks’. The Princeton Ocean Model implemented for the Japan/East Sea is used to demonstrate the existence of extremely strong thermohaline sources and sinks generated by the diagnostic initialization with the annual mean T c , S c from the Navy's Global Digital Environmental Model. The effects of extremely strong and spatially nonuniform initial heating/cooling (salting/freshening) rates on thermohaline and velocity fields need to be further investigated.