Relative strength of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current and Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation

Journal article

Abstract:: A simple relationship, based on thermal wind balance, is derived that relates the relative strength of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) and Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) to the ratios of three depth scales: the e-folding depth of the global stratification, the depth of maximum overturning streamfunction and the maximum depth of the ACC. For realistic values of these depth scales, the relationship predicts a factor 8 &pm; 4 difference in the volume transports of the ACC and AMOC, consistent with the observation-based ratio of 8 &pm; 2.

Files:: MarshallJohnson_Tellus2017.pdf

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Publisher:: Taylor and Francis
Journal:: Tellus A: Dynamic Meteorology and Oceanography More from this journal
Volume:: 69
Issue:: 1
Pages:: 1338884-1338884
Publication date:: 2017-06-26
Acceptance date:: 2017-05-29
DOI:: 10.1080/16000870.2017.1338884
EISSN:: 1600-0870
ISSN:: 0280-6495

Keywords:: meridional boundaries

hydrography

ocean currents

thermal wind

volume transports
Pubs id:: pubs:704530
UUID:: uuid:9ed14410-3c0f-4241-9ae8-79c718ff7f90
Local pid:: pubs:704530
Source identifiers:: 704530
Deposit date:: 2017-07-06

Copyright holder:: The authors
Notes:: Tellus A: 2017. © 2017 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited

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