DIVAnd (Data-Interpolating Variational Analysis, in n-dimensions) is a tool to interpolate observations on a regular grid using the variational inverse method. We have extended DIVAnd to include additional dynamic constraints relevant to surface currents, including imposing a zero normal velocity at the coastline, imposing a low horizontal divergence of the surface currents, temporal coherence and

Several years of surface wave observations in the Chukchi Sea reveal wave groups are a common feature in open water and ice-covered conditions. The strength of the groupiness, here characterized by the group factor, is well correlated with the characteristic wave steepness, the spectral bandwidth, and the Benjamin-Feir Index. The general finding is enhanced groupiness in ice. However, the trends with

South of the Vitória-Trindade Ridge, a seamount chain off East Brazil, the Brazil Current (BC) meanders cyclonically within Tubarão Bight, occasionally forming the Vitória Eddy. It was recently found that the Intermediate Western Boundary Current (IWBC), which flows equatorward below the BC, cyclonically recirculate within Tubarão Bight. We present an analysis of AVISO observations that suggest that

A Correction to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10236-020-01434-9

The sea surface velocity measurements obtained during the period of 2014–2016 using two high-frequency radars (HFR), which were installed on the northern coast of Vietnam, were reprocessed by using a variational approach (EOF/2dVar) to provide an extended dataset. The high temporal resolution of measurements and large spatial coverage of the radar data enabled the assessment of the surface circulation

Various uncertainties exist in a hindcast due to the inabilities of numerical models to resolve all the complicated atmosphere-sea interactions, and the lack of certain ground truth observations. Here, a comprehensive analysis of an atmospheric model performance in hindcast mode (Hurricane Weather and Research Forecasting model—HWRF) and its 40 ensembles during severe events is conducted, evaluating

Fronts in coastal oceans are important mesoscale processes that relate to regional dynamics and can impact ecosystems. The daily distribution of a sea surface temperature (SST) front is obtained in the East China Sea (ECS) using 15 years of satellite observations. High frontal activities are mainly found near the coast. The spatial and temporal variability of the monthly frontal probability is subsequently

We present research on the excitation of ocean surface wind waves in non-homogeneous situations, for the case of a deep water strait in the presence of a constant wind, blowing perpendicular to the coast line. The statistical wave model used is based on the Hasselmann equation with high-wavenumbers wave-breaking dissipation, exact non-linear four-wave interaction, and ZRP (Zakharov-Resio-Pushkarev

The three-dimensional transport of sediments released by the main rivers in the Colombian Caribbean basin is investigated using numerical model simulations. Different types of sediments (fine sands, very fine sands and coarse silts) were tracked by implementing SedimentDrift software, a subclass of the OpenDrift open-source trajectory framework. The simulations were forced with climatological winds

The Bohai Sea is a large, semi-enclosed bay of China with a transport timescale of more than 1 year. Residence time (RT) is an important indicator used to determine the water exchange rate of coastal oceans, and it has a significant influence on coastal ecosystems and the environment. In this study, the RT and its seasonal variability within the Bohai Sea were investigated using a 3-D hydrodynamic

Response of Ganga-Brahmaputra river plume to wind forcing in the Bay of Bengal is studied using a numerical ocean circulation model. Four different wind forcing scenarios, namely, winds over the entire model domain, no winds anywhere over the model domain, winds over Equatorial Indian Ocean only and winds over Bay of Bengal only, are considered. Model simulations are carried out in an idealized setting

The global tide is simulated with the global ocean general circulation model ICON-O using a newly developed tidal module, which computes the full tidal potential. The simulated coastal M2 amplitudes, derived by a discrete Fourier transformation of the output sea level time series, are compared with the according values derived from satellite altimetry (TPXO-8 atlas). The experiments are repeated with

The mutual feedback between the swash zone and the surf zone is known to affect large-scale morphodynamic processes such as breaker bar migration on sandy beaches. To fully resolve this feedback in a process-based manner, the morphodynamics in the swash zone and due to swash-swash interactions must be explicitly solved, e.g., by means of a wave-resolving numerical model. Currently, few existing models

Wind-generated ocean waves are key inputs for several studies and applications, both near the coast (coastal vulnerability assessment, coastal structures design, harbor operativity) and off-shore (a.o. oil and gas production, ship routes, and navigation safety). As such, the evaluation of trends in future wave climate is fundamental for the development of efficient policies in the framework of climate

Wave field data are affected not only by the accuracy of instruments recording them but also by sampling variability, an uncertainty due to the limited number of observations. For stationary meteorological conditions, due to the randomness of the sea surface elevation, wave parameters derived from a temporal or spatial wave record will depend on which part of a wave record is used in an analysis as

The plumes from the rivers of the South Brazilian Bight (SBB) and South Brazil (SB) were studied using a realistic model configuration. River plume variability on continental shelves is driven by the input of river runoff into the shelf, by wind variability, and also by ambient currents and its seasonal variability, especially the Brazil Current, which are realistically modelled in this study. It is

Most of the studies on extreme waves are focused on the systems with single-peak wave spectra. However, according to the statistics of occurrence, the bimodal spectral system is also frequent in real sea conditions. In order to summarize the statistics of extreme waves, irregular wave trains under single-peak and bimodal spectra for long durations are simulated in this paper, based on a two-dimensional

Sea ice on the Southern Ocean has large seasonal variations. Floe size distribution has an important influence on the dynamic and thermodynamic processes of sea ice in the region with large seasonal variation and the Marginal Ice Zone. In the work, we introduced a prognostic floe size distribution (FSD) into a sea ice model and improved the calculation of lateral melt of sea ice. On this basis, we

The surface enthalpy fluxes (latent and sensible heat fluxes) provide the necessary energy to intensify tropical cyclones (TCs). The surface momentum fluxes modify the intensity of TCs. Various parameters affect the surface fluxes. Drag and enthalpy exchange coefficients are known as parameters that lead to ambiguity in the surface fluxes. Thus, for simulating a TC, various drag and enthalpy exchange

The role of the Coriolis effect in the initial formation of bottom patterns in a tidal channel is studied by means of a linear stability analysis. The key finding is that the mechanism generating oblique tidal sand ridges on the continental shelf is also present in confined tidal channels. As a result, the Coriolis effect causes the fastest growing pattern to be a combination of tidal bars and oblique

Cold water anomalies were found in the middle layer in the northern Taiwan Strait in the spring of 2015. The cold water was located at a depth of approximately 10–20 m, with warm water situated both above and below this cold water layer. This study investigated this phenomenon using a three-dimensional operational ocean model, in which the sea-surface net heat flux was justified by nudging the appropriate

The contribution of sea-state-induced processes to sea-level variability is investigated through ocean-wave coupled simulations. These experiments are performed with a high-resolution configuration of the Geestacht COAstal model SysTem (GCOAST), implemented in the Northeast Atlantic, the North Sea and the Baltic Sea which are considered as connected basins. The GCOAST system accounts for wave-ocean

A coupled numerical model is developed based on the spectral element method (SEM) and boundary element method (BEM) to predict the characteristics of tsunami wave response on Pohang New Harbor (PNH), South Korea, and Paradip Port, India. The current numerical model is developed to analyze the impacts on the coastal region with slowly varying bathymetry under the resonance conditions. In this method

The high-frequency radar coastal network in Toulon operates in multistatic mode for the monitoring of the ocean circulation in the Northwestern Mediterranean Sea. With 2 transmitters and 2 receivers on 3 distant sites, it measures 4 different elliptical components of the surface velocity. We provide a methodology for improved current mapping using this augmented number of available projections and

In this study, deep circulation in the South China Sea (SCS) is investigated using results from mesoscale-eddy-resolving, regional simulations using the Hybrid Coordinate Ocean Model (HYCOM) verified by continuous current-meter observations. Analysis of these results provides a detailed spatial structure and temporal variability of the deep circulation in the SCS. The major features of the SCS deep

We studied the water age and transport of passive tracers in the Archipelago Sea, Baltic Sea, using the COHERENS 3D hydrodynamic model and the OpenDrift Lagrangian particle model. The mean water age, which was calculated with COHERENS over a period of 6 years, varied between 1 and 3 months in the outer archipelago and between 3 and 6 months in the middle archipelago. The water age was highest in the

The Unresolved Obstacles Source Term (UOST) is a general methodology for parameterizing the dissipative effects of subscale islands, cliffs, and other unresolved features in ocean wave models. Since it separates the dissipation from the energy advection scheme, it can be applied to any numerical scheme or any type of mesh. UOST is now part of the official release of WAVEWATCH III, and the freely available

The ocean thermal structure (OTS) is a significant element that affects tropical cyclone (TC) intensities, as energy drawn from the ocean fuels TCs. Satellite altimetry can be used to derive the OTS for TC research. The cooling of sea surface temperature (SST) caused by TCs is closely related to the OTS and differs according to differences in the OTS in different regions. However, the accuracy of existing

The Oujiang River Estuary (ORE) is a macrotidal estuary in southeast Zhejiang Province of China. Although the economy has developed rapidly over the past two decades, few studies have been explored on the estuarine dynamics. Based on in situ measurements, we established a 3-D numerical model to investigate salt intrusion and its response to river discharge, tide, and the salinity at river mouth. We

Sea spray comprises liquid droplets that cover a broad range of radii, from 0.01 to 1000 μm. For field observations, it is difficult to measure the sea spray size distribution over the full range of radii, particularly as spray production is associated with extreme weather conditions. As a result, differences in magnitude of the sea spray production estimates reach 6 orders. In this study, the sea

A multi-decadal simulation of ocean circulation in the northern Gulf of Mexico produces strong submesoscale instabilities in the Mississippi/Atchafalaya plume fronts. The model skill in reproducing these submesoscale frontal eddies over the Texas-Louisiana shelf is assessed using simulated and observed salinity and velocity fields as a way to investigate simulation accuracy and quantify the variability

Energy transfer mechanisms between the atmosphere and the deep ocean have been studied for many years. Their importance to the ocean’s energy balance and possible implications on mixing are widely accepted. The slab model by Pollard (Deep-Sea Res Oceanogr Abstr 17(4):795–812, 1970) is a well-established simulation of near-inertial motion and energy inferred through wind-ocean interaction. Such a model

In this study, synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imaging of waves across ocean fronts was investigated using C-band Sentinel-1 VV-polarized SAR imagery collected over the Yangtze and the Zhujiang estuaries. The presence of ocean fronts in the study area was confirmed by collocated sea surface temperature (SST) data provided by the Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) and sea surface current

Argo floats can be used to collect unique and spatiotemporally continuous eddy profiles as they are carried forward within eddies. Using satellite altimeter data, we designed and conducted an eddy-borne Argo float measurement experiment in a South China Sea (SCS) eddy generated in the southwest region of Taiwan. The Argo float was deployed at a location that was estimated to be in the eddy corridor

Global warming is changing the global wave climate, making waves stronger. In this study, we find that the wave climate in the South China Sea (SCS) undergoes an intensifying trend under global warming background, by examining the ERA-5 wave reanalysis data over 1979–2018. Results show a significant increase in most of the SCS, of 0.2% per year in significant wave height (SWH) and 0.15% per year in

Fatigue damage of offshore floating structures is a long-term cumulative process, which is mainly attributed to ocean waves. The natural variability and human-induced climate change may affect the wave climate and consequently result in the change of fatigue damage. This paper aims to investigate the effect of climate change on the fatigue damage of offshore floating structures operating in three offshore

The spatial and temporal variability of the high individual wave heights, which pose a hazard in India’s shelf seas, has not been investigated. In this study, the spatial and temporal variation of hourly maximum individual wave height (Hmax) in the Indian shelf seas is examined based on 40 years ERA5 Re-Analysis data from European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts. Waverider buoy data from

Tidal characteristics in the well-known Coastal Marine Proving Ground near Chudao Island located in Shandong Province, China, are firstly investigated based on Princeton Ocean Model (POM) with a generalized coordinate system. Numerical results having been validated by available observations, the ensemble transform–based sensitivity method that calculates the gradient of forecast error variance reduction

Variations in river hydraulic geometry (HG) are of fundamental importance to fluvial geomorphological research and catchment management. In tide-influenced river deltas, channel geometry displays a mixed scaling behavior since the channel forming discharge is of both tidal and river origins. This study aims to map the tidal signature on delta morphology in the Pearl River Delta (PRD) channel network

Surface windstress transfers energy to the surface mixed layer of the ocean, and this energy partly radiates as internal gravity waves with near-inertial frequencies into the stratified ocean below the mixed layer where it is available for mixing. Numerical and analytical models provide estimates of the energy transfer into the mixed layer and the fraction radiated into the interior, but with large

The original version of this article unfortunately contained a mistake.

Bioluminescence (BL) potential observations registered high BL potential emissions during the polar night of January 2012 at the mouth of a fjord Rijpfjorden (northern Svalbard, Norway). Notably, observations of BL potential at this location were significantly higher in the upper 50 m than observed BL potential at offshore stations located on the shelf-slope areas and in the deeper water off northern

Understanding the wave properties in centimeter to decameter (cmDm) wavelength range is of great interest to ocean remote sensing and air-sea interaction. For more than six decades, cmDm waves are generally considered to be in the equilibrium range, and its spectral function has a constant slope: − 5 or − 4 in the 1D frequency spectrum and − 3 or − 2.5 in the 1D wavenumber spectrum. Some variations

Typhoons can interact intensely with oceans, and the atmosphere–ocean interaction has an enormous impact on the intensity and structure of typhoons. To consider the impact of typhoon–ocean interactions, a regional coupled atmosphere–ocean system for operational forecasting of Western North Pacific typhoons is established in this paper based on a public coupled atmosphere–ocean framework and in accordance

San Francisco Bay (SFB) is a complex ecosystem that has been heavily impacted by human activities. It has experienced strong year-to-year variations in physical, chemical, and biological conditions, due to both natural climate variation and human activities. There is a need to investigate this long-term variation, with a focus on management practices and needs. The study aims to construct a coupled

Bayesian inference with coordinate transformations and polynomial chaos for a Gaussian process with a parametrized prior covariance model was introduced in Sraj et al. (Comput Methods Appl Mech Eng 298:205–228, 2016a) to enable and infer uncertainties in a parameterized prior field. The feasibility of the method was successfully demonstrated on a simple transient diffusion equation. In this work, we

Ocean waves are the main driver of sediment transport on open sandy coastlines, and inter-annual to multi-decadal variability in the wave climate significantly impacts year-on-year coastal risk. As such, the integration of large-scale climatic variability into local-scale coastal management studies is pertinent but seldom implemented in practice, mainly due to the lack of knowledge in this subject

This study presents a new approach to modeling marsh evolution. The Tidal Marsh Model (TMM) has been developed as a module within the SCHISM (Semi-implicit Cross-scale Hydroscience Integrated System Model) framework. Some unique features of the TMM are dynamic rates, cross-scale simulations, and incorporation of anthropogenic stressors, which allow it to overcome many limitations that current marsh

This research explores the novel use of the partial least squares regression (PLSR) as an alternative model to the conventional least squares (LS) model for modeling tide levels. The modeling is based on twenty tidal constituents: M2, S2, N2, K1, O1, MO3, MK3, MN4, M4, SN4, MS4, 2MN6, M6, 2MS6, S4, SK3, 2MK5, 2SM6, 3MK7, and M8. The 1st, 2nd, and 3rd PLSR components are selected from 40 PLSR components

The meandering of the Gulf Stream through the Straits of Florida is associated with eddy activity to the north (along the Florida Keys) and the south (along the Cuban coast). This study focuses on recently identified processes along the Cuban coast, namely anticyclonic eddies (Cuban ANticyclones: CubANs) and cyclonic activity characterized by cold-core eddies (cyclones) and coastal upwelling that enhances

Tidally dominated coasts are directly affected not only by projected rise in mean sea level, but also by changes in tidal dynamics due to sea level rise and bathymetric changes. By use of a hydrodynamic model, which covers the entire German Bight (South-Eastern North Sea), we analyse the effects of sea level rise and potential bathymetric changes in the Wadden Sea on tidal current velocities. The model

Operational ocean nowcast/forecast systems require real-time sampling of oceanic data for representing realistic oceanic conditions. Satellite altimetry plays a key role in detecting mesoscale variability of the ocean currents. The 10-day sampling period and horizontal gaps between the altimetry tracks of 100 km cause difficulties in capturing shorter-term/smaller-scale ocean current variations. Operational

The variability of the water mass exchange between the Arabian Gulf and the Indian Ocean is investigated using a high-resolution (1/36°) ocean model. We focus on the period from December 1996 to March 1998, having as reference in situ measurements at the Strait of Hormuz. Previous studies, based on models and observations, suggested a perpetual deep outflow, mainly in the southern part of the Strait

A partly coupled wave-ice model with the ability to resolve ice-induced attenuation on waves was developed using the Finite-Volume Community Ocean Model (FVCOM) framework and applied to the Great Lakes. Seven simple, flexible, and efficient parameterization schemes originating from the WAVEWATCH III® IC4 were used to quantify the wave energy loss during wave propagation under ice. The reductions of

It is important to achieve a better understanding of the wave energy variations occurring as a steep wave evolves towards breaking. Laboratory experiments of focused waves are performed to investigate the kinematics of primary breaking waves. When a primary wave evolves towards breaking, the increase in the maximum kinetic energy is stronger than the increase in the maximum potential energy. Furthermore

While moderate wind and wave conditions prevail in the eastern equatorial Pacific, modeling waves in this area remains challenging due to the presence of multiple wave systems converging from different parts of the ocean. This area is covered by swells originated far away including the storm belts of both hemispheres, coexisting with local generation due to the regular action of both the southern trade

The blooms of the toxic dinoflagellate Karenia selliformis can be predicted with accuracy derived from knowledge of the main forcing variables. A naive Bayes classifier modeling framework, a member of the Bayesian network family, is used to identify the phytoplankton community and the physical and meteorological parameters involving K. selliformis blooms in the eutrophic Boughrara Lagoon (BL), Tunisia

A dense network of instruments has been deployed within harbors along the Mediterranean coast, in the Toulon Metropole area, between the Hyères islands and the Sanary Bay in the framework of the observation network HTM-NET. Each station is equipped with two piezometric sensors, the first immersed and the second emerged, which allows the calculation of the water level. Both piezometric sensors are also

Low-frequency interannual climatic oscillations have been reported to influence the precipitation regimes, river discharges, winds, and sea level in the Caribbean Sea. Here, we analyzed the presence and relevance of low-frequency oscillations in the waves’ climate of the Caribbean Sea using data from WAVEWATCH III (NOAA) reanalysis and applying frequency domain wavelet transform technique. Results

The tides in the Mediterranean Sea are generally weaker than in other regions of the world ocean, but are locally intensified in passages with complex bathymetry, such as the Gibraltar Strait and the Sicily Channel. To date, a detailed understanding of their effects on the circulation, on the short time scales relevant to forecasting, is still missing, due to the lack of specific observations, and