Biophysical 3D modeling approach of the Canary Current System: a ROMS-PISCES coupling study

Máster Universitario en Oceanografía

Modelización tridimensional del Ecosistema de la Corriente de Canarias: un estudio de acoplamiento ROMS-PISCES

[ES]Las denominadas Corrientes de Frontera Este comprenden ecosistemas complejos debido a la presencia de procesos a mesoscala y submesoscala que aumentan la variabilidad del sistema. Los modelos de acoplamiento físico-biológico son herramientas bastante interesantes para ayudar a entender dicha variabilidad. Aunque se han desarrollado modelos para los sistemas de afloramiento de las Corrientes de California y de Humboldt, el Ecosistema de la Corriente de Canarias sigue sin ser ampliamente estudiado bajo este enfoque. En este trabajo mostramos los primeros resultados de un modelo acoplado ROMS (Sistema de Modelización de Oceanografía Regional)-PISCES (Esquema de Interacción Pelágica para Estudios de Carbono y de Ecosistemas) para el Ecosistema de la Corriente de Canarias. PISCES simula la productividad oceánica y la variabilidad espacio-temporal de los ciclos de carbono y de nutrientes (P, N, Si, Fe). Como un primer paso, hemos usado la distribución de clorofila como proxy para determinar el funcionamiento del modelo. Se ha observado que los patrones de la distribución de clorofila concuerdan bastante bien con las observaciones realizadas por imágenes de satélite, aunque también se observa que el modelo subestima los valores de las concentraciones. También se compara la distribución de clorofila en la columna de agua con datos reales observándose una buena relación con la clorofila modelada. Además, se incluyen directrices a seguir para mejorar el modelo.

Generation of the Cape Ghir upwelling filament: a numerical study

[EN] Filaments are narrow, shallow structures of cool water originating from the coast. They are typical features of the four main eastern boundary upwelling systems (EBUS). In spite of their significant biological and chemical roles, through the offshore exportation of nutrient-rich waters, the physical processes that generate them are still not completely understood. This paper is a process-oriented study of filament generation mechanisms. Our goal is twofold: firstly, to obtain a numerical solution able to well represent the characteristics of the filament off Cape Ghir (30°38'N, northwestern Africa) in the Canary EBUS and secondly, to explain its formation by a simple mechanism based on the balance of potential vorticity. The first goal is achieved by the use of the ROMS model (Regional Ocean Modeling System) in embedded domains around Cape Ghir, with a horizontal resolution going up to 1.5 km for the finest domain. The latter gets its initial and boundary conditions from a parent solution and is forced by climatological, high-resolution atmospheric fields. The modeled filaments display spatial, temporal and physical characteristics in agreement with the available in situ and satellite observations. This model solution is used as a reference to compare the results with a set of process-oriented experiments. These experiments allow us to reach the second objective. Their respective solution serves to highlight the contribution of various processes in the filament generation. Since the study is focused on general processes present under climatological forcing conditions, inter-annual forcing is not necessary. The underlying idea for the filament generation is the balance of potential vorticity in the Canary EBUS: the upwelling jet is characterized by negative relative vorticity and flows southward along a narrow band of uniform potential vorticity. In the vicinity of the cape, an injection of relative vorticity induced by the wind breaks the existing vorticity balance. The upwelling jet is prevented from continuing its way southward and has to turn offshore to follow lines of equal potential vorticity. The model results highlight the essential role of wind, associated with the particular topography (coastline and bottom) around the cape. The mechanism presented here is general and thus can be applied to other EBUS.

Towards the construction of a validated numerical system to study the mesoscale dynamics of the North East Atlantic (2003-2006)

Máster en Oceanografía