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Low-vertical-wavenumber hump in the internal wave energy spectra observed in the Antarctic Circumpolar Current region
  • Anne Takahashi,
  • Toshiyuki Hibiya
Anne Takahashi
University of Tokyo

Corresponding Author:[email protected]

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Toshiyuki Hibiya
University of Tokyo
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Abstract

Finescale parameterizations are powerful tools for estimating the global distribution of turbulent dissipation rates ε. However, they tend to overestimate ε in the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) region, where bottom-reaching geostrophic flows accompanying vigorous eddies coexist with energetic internal waves: near-inertial internal waves generated by wind disturbances in the upper ocean and internal lee waves generated by the ACC impinging on the small-scale bottom topography. In this study, we explore the reason for such overestimates by analyzing the datasets from the simultaneous microstructure and finestructure measurements carried out in the ACC region. We find that, at the locations where finescale parameterizations overestimate ε, vertical wavenumber spectra of internal wave energy are distorted from the canonical Garrett-Munk (GM) spectrum by a spectral “hump” at low wavenumbers (~ 0.01 cpm). The existing finescale parameterizations formulated based on the “white” GM spectrum overestimates ε for “red” vertical wavenumber spectra. In the ACC region, such shear (strain) spectra with a hump are mainly located in the upper ocean (at near-bottom). Multivariate correlation analyses between the magnitude of spectral humps and various physical parameters suggests that shear (strain) spectral humps are caused by low-vertical-wavenumber near-inertial wave (internal lee wave) packets superposed on a GM-like internal wave field, and these internal wave packets are generated and amplified by large scale geostrophic shear flows.