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Characterizing the capability of mesoscale eddies to carry drifters in the northwest Pacific

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Abstract

Mesoscale eddies are common oceanic phenomena. Although many related studies have been conducted, the ability for mesoscale eddies to carry real particles remains poorly addressed. We considered the drifters as real particles to characterize the capability of mesoscale eddies to carry particles. Firstly, mesoscale eddies in the northwest Pacific (99°E–180°E, 0°–66°N) were identified using sea level anomaly (SLA) data from 1993 to 2015. Secondly, three important parameters (the carrying days, the number of circles the drifter revolving around the eddy center, and the carrying distances) were calculated by colocalizing eddy data with drifters. Finally, statistical analysis and composite analysis were conducted, reflecting the capability of mesoscale eddies to carry particles. The mechanisms on the carrying capability of eddies were also discussed. Results show that (1) the motion of carried drifters reflects the upper limit of rotational speed of eddies that the drifters revolve around the eddy center by ≤ 90° for one day in most cases; (2) the drifters tend to be carried for a longer time when their minimal distances to the eddy center measured with normalized distance are small; (3) there are two types of eddies (cyclonic and anticyclonic eddies) in different subregions of northwest Pacific, and each has a different carrying capability (on average, similar in the tropical ocean and Subtropical Countercurrent, cyclonic eddies tend to have stronger carrying capability in Southern Kuroshio Extension, and anticyclonic eddies tend to have stronger carrying capability in Northern Kuroshio Extension and Subarctic Gyre); (4) on average, the carried drifters tend to travel for a longer time around the normalized eddy radii ranging from 0.41 to 0.76; (5) the carrying days are related to the Rossby number of the eddy (in general when the Rossby number is smaller, the carrying days are longer).

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Acknowledgment

We sincerely appreciate two reviewers and Dr. ZHANG Zhengguang for detailed and valuable suggestions. The eddy identification and tracking program is from Dr. NI Qinbiao. The altimeter products used in this study are distributed by Archiving Validation and Interpretation of Satellite Data in Oceanography (AVISO), the Centre National d’Études Spatiales (CNES) of France (http://www.aviso.altimetry.fr/en/data/products/sea-surface-height-products/global.html), the drifter data are provide from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) (https://www.aoml.noaa.gov/phod/gdp/hourly_data.php) and the geostrophic velocity anomaly data were provided by the Copernicus Marine Environment Monitoring Service (CMEMS) (http://marine.copernicus.eu/).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Meteorology and Oceanography, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha, 410073, China

    Huizan Wang, Ding Liu, Weimin Zhang & Bo Wang

  2. Naval Research Academy, Tianjin, 300061, China

    Jiaxun Li

Authors
  1. Huizan Wang
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  2. Ding Liu
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  3. Weimin Zhang
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  4. Jiaxun Li
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  5. Bo Wang
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Huizan Wang.

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Data Availability Statement

The datasets generated and analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (No. 2018YFC1406202) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 41976188)

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Wang, H., Liu, D., Zhang, W. et al. Characterizing the capability of mesoscale eddies to carry drifters in the northwest Pacific. J. Ocean. Limnol. 38, 1711–1728 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00343-019-9149-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00343-019-9149-y

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