2016 Ocean Sciences Meeting

February 21-26

The ocean dynamics at high northern and southern latitudes exhibit a rich range of behavior that differ substantially from those at lower latitudes.  For example, the classical subtropical Sverdup solution does not provide a lowest-order description of the wind-driven circulation at high latitudes.  The large-scale flow instead appears jet-like, often associated with mixing barriers, as in the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) and in topographically-guided boundary currents. Mesoscale eddies emerge as key agents in fluxing tracers, momentum, and vorticity across such jets. Topographic control, the possible presence of sea ice or ice shelves, and extremes of strong and weak stratification, are all characteristics found both in the high north and high south. Yet important differences exist: for example, high-latitude northern hemisphere boundary currents typically flow in the same direction as planetary/topographic Rossby wave phase propagation, while the ACC flows in the opposite direction. We invite observationalists, modelers, and theoreticians to submit talks and posters that focus on the dynamics of the large-scale and mesoscale dynamics of high latitudes. The aim is to bring together scientists with expertise from south and from north to discuss both similarities and differences between the two hemispheres.