PS11A:
Turbulent Mixing of the Ocean Surface Boundary Layer: Observation, Simulation, and Parameterization I

Session ID#: 92522

Session Description:
The turbulent ocean surface boundary layer (OSBL) communicates heat, mass, and momentum between the atmosphere and ocean interior, hosts the majority of oceanic primary productivity, and plays a key role in the evolution of the earth system over seasonal to centennial time scales. Representing variability in OSBL turbulent mixing is an abiding challenge in the modeling of earth systems due to the complexity of turbulent OSBL processes and their interaction with atmospheric turbulence, ocean interior mixing, surface waves, submesoscale processes, and sea ice.

This session invites contributions from both observational, numerical, and theoretical process studies as well as parameterization development work relating to OSBL turbulent mixing. We are interested in all processes that might affect OSBL turbulent mixing and the evolution of the OSBL, including wind-driven mixing, convection, and wave-driven turbulence --- as well as frontal instabilities and submesoscale baroclinic processes emerging from the breakdown of larger-scale currents.

The focus of this oral sub-session is on observation and parameterization of turbulent mixing in the OSBL.

Co-Sponsor(s):
  • AI - Air-Sea Interactions
  • OB - Ocean Biology and Biogeochemistry
  • OM - Ocean Modeling
Index Terms:

1622 Earth system modeling [GLOBAL CHANGE]
4504 Air/sea interactions [OCEANOGRAPHY: PHYSICAL]
4568 Turbulence, diffusion, and mixing processes [OCEANOGRAPHY: PHYSICAL]
4572 Upper ocean and mixed layer processes [OCEANOGRAPHY: PHYSICAL]
Primary Chair:  Ivan B. Savelyev, US Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, United States
Co-chairs:  Gregory LeClaire Wagner, MIT, Cambridge, United States, Leah Johnson, Brown University, Providence, RI, United States and Qing Li, Brown University, Department of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences, Providence, United States; Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM, United States
Primary Liaison:  Ivan B. Savelyev, Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, United States
Moderators:  Brandon G Reichl, URI GSO, Narragansett, United States and Gregory LeClaire Wagner, MIT, Cambridge, United States
Student Paper Review Liaisons:  Leah Johnson, Applied Physics Laboratory University of Washington, Seattle, United States and Ivan B. Savelyev, Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, United States

Abstracts Submitted to this Session:

PS11A-01
Detailed Observations of Centimetre-Scale Structures and Entrainment in the Transition Layer (649525)
Alexis Kaminski, Applied Physics Laboratory, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States, Eric A D'Asaro, Applied Physics Lab, Univ of Washington, Seattle, United States, Andrey Y. Shcherbina, Applied Physics Laboratory, Seattle, WA, United States and Ramsey R Harcourt, Applied Physics Laboratory, University of Washington, Seattle, United States
PS11A-02
Turbulence measurements from the SPURS-2 mooring (647637)
Seth Zippel, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, United States, J. Thomas Farrar, Woods Hole Oceanographic Inst, Department of Physical Oceanography, Woods Hole, United States and Carol Anne Clayson, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Physical Oceanography, Woods Hole, MA, United States
PS11A-03
Scaling turbulence in the ocean boundary layer of the Southeast Pacific Ocean stratus region (654349)
Una Miller, Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory, Palisades, NY, United States; Columbia University of New York, Earth and Environmental Sciences, New York, NY, United States, Christopher J Zappa, Columbia University, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, Palisades, NY, United States, J. Thomas Farrar, Woods Hole Oceanographic Inst, Department of Physical Oceanography, Woods Hole, United States, Deborah A Le Bel, Lamont -Doherty Earth Observatory, Palisades, NY, United States and Robert A Weller, WHOI, Monument Beach, MA, United States
PS11A-04
Fast ice controls on turbulent mixing rates on the West Antarctic Peninsula shelf (651380)
J. Alexander Brearley, NERC British Antarctic Survey, Cambridge, United Kingdom and Mark E Inall, Scottish Association for Marine Science, Oban, United Kingdom
PS11A-05
Parametrisation of the Ocean Surface Boundary Layer: The OSMOSIS scheme (645547)
Stephen Belcher, Met Office, United Kingdom, Alan L Grant, University of Reading, Reading, RG6, United Kingdom, A. J. George Nurser, National Oceanography Center, Liverpool, United Kingdom, Natasha Sarah Lucas, Bangor University, School of Ocean Sciences, Menai Bridge, United Kingdom, Tom Philip Rippeth, Bangor University, School of Ocean Sciences, Bangor, Wales, United Kingdom, Brodie Pearson, Brown University, Geological Sciences, Providence, RI, United States, Jeff Polton, National Oceanography Centre, Liverpool, United Kingdom, Matthew D Palmer, UK National Oceanography Centr, Liverpool, United Kingdom, Gillian Mary Damerell, University of East Anglia, Norwich, United Kingdom, Karen J. Heywood, University of East Anglia, Centre for Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, School of Environmental Science, Norwich, United Kingdom, Christian E. Buckingham, Université de Bretagne Occidentale, Département de Physique, Brest, France and Alberto Naveira Garabato, University of Southampton, Ocean and Earth Science, Southampton, SO14, United Kingdom
PS11A-06
The OSMOSIS Parametrisation of the Ocean Surface Boundary Layer (OSBL) in Global Runs of the NEMO Ocean Circulation Model (651486)
A. J. George Nurser1, Alan L Grant2, Stephen E Belcher3, Mike Bell4, Adam Tobias Blaker1, Alex Megann5 and Catherine Guiavarc'h4, (1)National Oceanography Centre, Southampton, United Kingdom, (2)University of Reading, Reading, RG6, United Kingdom, (3)Univ Reading, Reading, United Kingdom, (4)Met Office Hadley center for Climate Change, Exeter, United Kingdom, (5)National Oceanography Center, Liverpool, United Kingdom
PS11A-07
Eddy-Diffusivity Mass-Flux Parameterization: A new Approach to unify Diffusion and Convection in Ocean Models (639546)
Herve Giordani, CNRM-GAME, Toulouse Cedex 01, France, Romain Bourdalle-Badie, Mercator-Ocean, Ramonville, France and Gurvan Madec, CNRS, Sorbonne Université, Paris, France
PS11A-08
Quantifying the Uncertainty of Upper Ocean Turbulence Parameterizations (652698)
Andre Souza1, Gregory LeClaire Wagner2 and Raffaele M Ferrari2, (1)Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, United States, (2)MIT, Cambridge, United States
See more of: Physical Oceanography: Mesoscale and Smaller