Energetics and Transfer of Submesoscale Brine-Driven Eddies at a Sea Ice Edge

Author:

Lo Piccolo Anna1,Horvat Christopher12,Fox-Kemper Baylor1

Affiliation:

1. a Department of Earth, Environmental, and Planetary Sciences, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island

2. b Department of Physics, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand

Abstract

Abstract During polar winter, refreezing of exposed ocean areas results in the rejection of brine, i.e., salt-enriched plumes of water, a source of available potential energy that can drive ocean instabilities. As this process is highly localized, and driven by sea ice physics, not gradients in oceanic or atmospheric buoyancy, it is not currently captured in modern climate models. This study aims to understand the energetics and lateral transfer of density at a semi-infinite, instantaneously opened, and continuously refreezing sea ice edge through a series of high-resolution model experiments. We show that kilometer-scale submesoscale eddies grow from baroclinic instabilities via an inverse energy cascade. These eddies meander along the ice edge and propagate laterally. The lateral transfer of buoyancy by eddies is not explained by existing theories. We isolate the fundamental forcing-independent quantities driving lateral mixing and discuss the implications for the overall strength of submesoscale activity in the Arctic Ocean.

Funder

Schmidt Future

NSF

Schmidt Futures

Publisher

American Meteorological Society

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4. Modifying the mixed layer eddy parameterization to include frontogenesis arrest by boundary layer turbulence;Bodner, A. S.,2023

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