What role does the ocean play in climate change?

The ocean circulation strongly influences regional climates, particularly in the tropics. However, little is known about how ocean circulation may change as the climate changes. RSMAS has numerous ongoing programs in both field studies (Figure 4) as well as modelling studies (Figure 5) aimed at understanding the ocean’s role in climate change.

Figure 4: In the tropics, the atmosphere and ocean transport equivalent amounts of heat poleward. Interannual variability in these oceanic cells may have a large influence on the climate of the Atlantic. The schematic to the left shows the pathways and water masses of the circulation. The image below shows the observational system that has been established to observe this phenomenon as part of the Tropical Atlantic Circulation Experiment. Contact: Bill Johns (Click thumbnails for larger images) (For more information, see http://www.clivar.org/organization/atlantic/TACE/).

Figure 5: Like the ocean, the atmosphere has an overturning cell in the tropics, the Hadley cell, which transports heat away from the equator. The interaction between these oceanic and atmospheric cells is not well-understood. This figure shows results from a modelling study which makes a first attempt at understanding this interaction. The top row shows the Hadley cell for the modern climate for Dec-Feb (left) and Jun-Aug (right). The contours show the streamfunction, which indicates the sense of the flow: positive values show clockwise flow and negative values, counterclockwise. The second panel shows a simulation of the Hadley cell without the influence of the ocean. Both the structure and intensity of the cell are strongly influenced by the ocean circuation. That is, even the most basic aspects of the ocean and atmospheric circulation have not been answered. Contact: Amy Clement (Click thumbnail for larger image)