PL21A:
Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation: Modeling and Observations I


Session ID#: 36771

Session Description:
Through its associated heat, salt, and carbon transports, the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) significantly influences the climate of the North Atlantic and surrounding areas and can even impact global climate through interactions with atmosphere on seasonal to multi-decadal timescales. Because the memory of the ocean vastly exceeds that of the atmosphere, AMOC is thought to represent the dynamical memory of the climate system, playing a major role in climate variations, hence in climate predictions, on these and even longer, i.e., centennial to millennial, timescales. Support for such a prominent role for AMOC on long time scales comes from coupled general circulation model simulations and proxy records. On shorter, i.e., intra-seasonal to decadal, timescales, measurements of transports, heat content, and other variables throughout the Atlantic Ocean have been instrumental in investigating the spatial structure, mechanisms, and impacts of AMOC variability, showing the importance of processes from the mesoscale to the basin scale. A synergy of knowledge gained from all these efforts will lead to a better understanding of AMOC.

We invite contributions from modeling and observational (both instrumental and proxy) studies, investigating AMOC variability and mechanisms as well as its role in climate predictions on various, e.g., decadal, timescales.

Primary Chair:  Gokhan Danabasoglu, National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO, United States
Co-chairs:  Femke de Jong, Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, Ocean Science Systems, Texel, Netherlands, Rong Zhang, NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory and Meric A Srokosz, National Oceanography Center, Soton, Southampton, United Kingdom
Moderators:  Rong Zhang, NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, Gokhan Danabasoglu, National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO, United States, Femke de Jong, Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, Ocean Science Systems, Texel, Netherlands and Meric A Srokosz, National Oceanography Centre, United Kingdom
Student Paper Review Liaisons:  Rong Zhang, NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory and Femke de Jong, Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, Ocean Science Systems, Texel, Netherlands
Index Terms:

4255 Numerical modeling [OCEANOGRAPHY: GENERAL]
4262 Ocean observing systems [OCEANOGRAPHY: GENERAL]
4263 Ocean predictability and prediction [OCEANOGRAPHY: GENERAL]
4532 General circulation [OCEANOGRAPHY: PHYSICAL]
Cross-Topics:
  • OM - Ocean Modeling
  • PC - Past, Present and Future Climate

Abstracts Submitted to this Session:

Decadal variability in NADW circulation measured by the MOVE array and GRACE satellite data (321794)
Jannes Koelling1, Matthias J Lankhorst1, Uwe Send1 and Eleanor Frajka-Williams2, (1)Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, CA, United States, (2)National Oceanography Centre, Southampton, United Kingdom
Subpolar North Atlantic overturning and gyre circulation and heat and freshwater fluxes from two OSNAP high resolution hydrographic sections in the summers of 2014 and 2016 (306423)
Naomi P Holliday1, Brian A. King1, Stefan Gary2, Stuart A. Cunningham2, Johannes Karstensen3, Elaine McDonagh1, Sheldon Bacon1, Feili Li4 and King Brian1, (1)National Oceanography Centre, Southampton, United Kingdom, (2)Scottish Association for Marine Science, Oban, United Kingdom, (3)GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research, Kiel, Kiel, Germany, (4)Duke University, Durham, NC, United States
What is the role of the rossby waves in the seasonal cycle of the AMOC? (305407)
Pedro Vélez-Belchí, Spanish Institute of Oceanography, Centro Oceanográfico de Canarias, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Spain, M. Dolores Pérez-Hernández, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Physical Oceanography, Woods Hole, MA, United States; Marine and freshwater research institute, Reykjavik, Iceland, Maria Casanova-Masjoan, Instituto de Oceanografía y Cambio Global, Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria,, Spain, Luis Cana, Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain and Alonso Hernández-Guerra, Instituto de Oceanografía y Cambio Global, Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain

See more of: Physical Oceanography: Mesoscale and Larger