A synthesis and mechanism study of variability of Kuroshio transport and its impacts on circulation in the East China Sea

The Kuroshio Current (KC) responds to changes in wind stress in the North Pacific Ocean. Its transport is affected by variations in the wind-stress curl both locally and remotely through topographic and planetary Rossby waves. We analyze observations and data-assimilated products to quantify amplitudes, spatial patterns and time scales of KC variability and use a process-oriented model to identify forcing mechanisms. The cross-shelf exchange processes in the East China Sea (ECS) are studied with the process-model simulations. The Kuroshio intrusion into the ECS is affected by several processes, including the Ekman and topographic Sverdrup transport in response to changes in local wind stress, eddy fluxes across the shelf break, variations in the Tsushima Warm Current, the upwind current responses to the local wind stress along the Yellow Sea Trough and the transport through the Taiwan Strait.