Category: Physical Oceanography

Map showing surface current velocity vectors (in red) measured with the NOAA Ship Nancy Foster's hull-mounted acoustic Doppler current profiler

Collaborative NOAA Research Cruise Studies Role of Ocean Currents in Larval Fish Distribution in Gulf of America and Caribbean

A team of NOAA oceanographers sets sail from Miami aboard the NOAA Ship Nancy Foster on May 7th to investigate ocean currents and fish larvae distribution in the southern Gulf of America and western Caribbean. The joint cruise between NOAA’s Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory (AOML) and Southeast Fisheries Science Center (SEFSC) is a new chapter in a long-term effort that pools cross-line office resources to better understand the early life history and larval recruitment pathways of important fisheries in the region, including the ecologically important and commercially valuable Atlantic bluefin tuna.

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New Study Describes Link Between South Atlantic Ocean and Global Rainfall Variability

In a recent paper published in the Journal of Climate, scientists with NOAA and the University of Miami have identified how variability in ocean circulation in the South Atlantic Ocean may influence global rainfall and climate patterns. The study by researchers at NOAA’s Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory (AOML) and the Cooperative Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Studies (CIMAS) suggests that the South Atlantic is a potential predictor of global rainfall variability with a lead-time of approximately 20 years. This link between the South Atlantic Ocean and weather and climate could provide significant long-term insight for water management on a global scale.

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The R/V Roger Revelle docked in Fremantle, Australia prior to the GO-SHIP cruise. Image credit: NOAA

AOML Oceanographers Collect Coast to Coast Measurements on the GO-SHIP Indian Ocean Cruise

During the months of March and April, AOML joined an international team of oceanographers to actively sample the Indian Ocean in support of the Global Ocean Ship-Based Hydrographic Investigation Program (GO-SHIP), an initiative to measure and investigate the ocean basins from coast to coast and from top to bottom. Aboard the R/V Roger Revelle, the team transected the Indian Ocean from the Antarctic northward into the Bay of Bengal, collecting seawater samples at 113 stations as part of a multi-decadal effort to measure various ocean properties, including temperature, salinity, nutrients, carbon and other gases.

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New Antenna System Design Improves Reliability and Significantly Reduces Cost

Scientists and engineers from NOAA have successfully designed, built, and tested a new antenna system that dramatically increases data transmission reliability while drastically reducing operating costs. The new Iridium-based transmission system, developed by NOAA’s Atlantic Oceanographic & Meteorological Laboratory (AOML) & the Cooperative Institute for Marine & Atmospheric Studies (CIMAS), has no restrictions on data format or size, allowing data from various ocean and land-based observation platforms to be transmitted more securely and at a fraction of the cost of the older Inmarsat-C platform.

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(left column) Seasonality of precipitation and 850mb winds for the monsoon regions as measured by the difference between June-July-August-September (JJAS) minus annual mean precipitation and winds. (middle-column) shows the composite difference of JJAS precipitation (shaded) and 850mb wind for each monsoon region with respect to weak minus strong SAMHT at lead-time 20 years after the anomalous SAMHT. Blue stipples indicates regions where precipitation differences are significant at 95% confidence level based on a non-parametric Kolmogorov-Smirnov test. (right-column) Lag-lead Spearman ranked correlation between SAMHT and NH monsoon index. The blue dashed lines depict the 95% significance level based on a non-parametric Kendall-t test. Negative lag indicates periods when SAMHT leads the NH monsoon index. Periods with significant correlation between the SAMHT and monsoon are shaded blue. Image Credit: NOAA AOML.

Meridional heat transport in the South Atlantic reveals links with global monsoons

A recent paper published in the Journal of Climate led by PHOD researchers Hosmay Lopez, Shenfu Dong, Sang-Ki Lee, and Gustavo Goni provides a physical mechanism on how low frequency variability of the South Atlantic Meridional Heat Transport (SAMHT) associated with the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation ( AMOC) may influence decadal variability of atmospheric circulation and monsoons. This is the first attempt to link the South Atlantic Overturning Circulation variability to weather and climate.

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