An assessment on the scientific impact of random errors in wind direction (< 45°) retrieved from space-based observations under weak wind (< 7 m/s) conditions was made. Half of the winds over global oceans are below 7 m/s, in their long-term averages, and these weak winds cover most of the tropical, subtropical , and coastal oceans. Introduction of these errors in the semi-daily winds causes, o...

An ocean general circulation model of the tropical Atlantic Ocean is used to study the vertically integrated vorticity equation for the annual mean flow in the Atlantic North Equatorial Countercurrent (NECC). It is found that the nonlinear terms play an important role in the vorticity budget, in the western part of the basin. Sverdrup balance does not hold in the region of the North Brazil Curr...

The Great Australian Bight south of Australia is an important link for the flow of surface, intermediate and deep water between the Indian and Pacific Ocean. Carbon-14 is a tracer of this flow and for the first time, water samples for subsequent carbon-14 analysis were collected at several locations within the Bight. We report and discuss the observed carbon-14 distribution in relation to the g...

Chlorofluorocarbon (CFC) and hydrographic data from the World Ocean Circulation Experiment (WOCE) Indian Ocean expedition are used to evaluate contributions to decadal ventilation of water masses. At a given density, CFC-derived ages increase and concentrations decrease from the south to north, with lowest concentrations and oldest ages in Bay of Bengal. Average ages for thermocline water are z...

Introduction Ocean optics concerns studies of light and its propagation through the ocean, and bio-optics connotes biological effects on optical properties and vice versa. These two terms are so intertwined that they are often used interchangeably. Knowledge of the variability of optical and bio-optical properties of the ocean is important for many scientific and practical problems (e.g., Dicke...

Narrow foraging specialization may increase the vulnerability of marine predators to climate change. The red-legged kittiwake (Rissa brevirostris) is endemic to the Bering Sea and has experienced drastic population fluctuations in recent decades, presumably due to climate-driven changes in food resources. Red-legged kittiwakes are presumed to be a nocturnal surface-foraging seabird that feed al...

(Growth of red and green strains of the tropical agarophyte Gracilaria cornea J. Agardh (Gracilariales, Rhodophyta) in laboratory). Gracilaria cornea J. Agardh is an important agarophyte occurring in the western Atlantic Ocean. Green colour individuals of G. cornea were found in a natural population, growing next to red individuals, which were more common. Due to the importance of colour strain...

[1] A growing number of paleoceanographic observations suggest that the ocean’s deep ventilation is stronger in warm climates than in cold climates. Here we use a general ocean circulation model to test the hypothesis that this relation is due to the reduced sensitivity of seawater density to temperature at low mean temperature; that is, at lower temperatures the surface cooling is not as effec...

The Ocean Circulation and Climate Advanced Modelling (OCCAM) global, eddy-permitting ocean general circulation model has been used to investigate the surface eddy mass flux in the Southern Ocean. The isopycnal eddy mass flux in the surface layer is almost uniformly poleward and scales well with the local Ekman transport. This seems at odds with other models and observations suggesting topograph...