Observed regimes of submesoscale dynamics in the Southern Ocean seasonal ice zone

Channing J. Prend (), Sebastiaan Swart, Andrew L. Stewart, Marcel D. Plessis, Georgy E. Manucharyan and Andrew F. Thompson
Additional contact information
Channing J. Prend: University of Washington
Sebastiaan Swart: University of Gothenburg
Andrew L. Stewart: University of California Los Angeles
Marcel D. Plessis: University of Gothenburg
Georgy E. Manucharyan: University of Washington
Andrew F. Thompson: California Institute of Technology

Nature Communications, 2025, vol. 16, issue 1, 1-11

Abstract: Abstract Submesoscale flows, occurring at scales of about 1–10 km, are crucial to the vertical transport of heat and other tracers in the upper ocean. These flows are energized by instabilities that extract potential energy from lateral buoyancy gradients, which are ubiquitous in the seasonal sea ice zone. Process studies have shown that submesoscale flows influence sea ice mechanics and thermodynamics. However, it is necessary to quantify the spatiotemporal distribution of submesoscale fluxes in order to upscale their impact. Here, we utilize hydrographic data from seal-borne sensors to demonstrate that the Southern Ocean seasonal ice zone can be separated into three regimes of submesoscale flux variability, which are associated with distinct dominant drivers. Furthermore, the magnitude and sign of the mean heat fluxes in these regimes differs, which dictates their influence on the upper-ocean heat budget, mixed-layer depth, and sea ice properties.

Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-025-63775-7 Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:16:y:2025:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-025-63775-7

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-025-63775-7

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().