Zavala-Hidalgo, J., Yu, P., Morey, S. L., Bourassa, M. A., & O'Brien, J. J. (2003). A new interpolation method for high frequency forcing fields (J. Cote, Ed.). Research Activities in Atmospheric and Oceanic Modeling, Report No. 33. Geneva, Switzerland: World Meteorological Organization.
Zavala-Hidalgo, J., Morey, S. L., O'Brien, J. J., & Zamudio, L. (2006). On the Loop Current eddy shedding variability. Atmosfera , 19 (1), 41–48.
Zavala-Hidalgo, J., Pares-Sierra, A., & Ochoa, J. (2002). Seasonal variability of the temperature and heat fluxes in the Gulf of Mexico. Atmosfera , 15 (2), 81–104.
Zeng, H., Chambers, J. Q., Negron-Juarez, R. I., Hurtt, G. C., Baker, D. B., & Powell, M. D. (2009). Impacts of tropical cyclones on U.S. forest tree mortality and carbon flux from 1851 to 2000. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A , 106 (19), 7888–7892.
Abstract: Tropical cyclones cause extensive tree mortality and damage to forested ecosystems. A number of patterns in tropical cyclone frequency and intensity have been identified. There exist, however, few studies on the dynamic impacts of historical tropical cyclones at a continental scale. Here, we synthesized field measurements, satellite image analyses, and empirical models to evaluate forest and carbon cycle impacts for historical tropical cyclones from 1851 to 2000 over the continental U.S. Results demonstrated an average of 97 million trees affected each year over the entire United States, with a 53-Tg annual biomass loss, and an average carbon release of 25 Tg y(-1). Over the period 1980-1990, released CO(2) potentially offset the carbon sink in forest trees by 9-18% over the entire United States. U.S. forests also experienced twice the impact before 1900 than after 1900 because of more active tropical cyclones and a larger extent of forested areas. Forest impacts were primarily located in Gulf Coast areas, particularly southern Texas and Louisiana and south Florida, while significant impacts also occurred in eastern North Carolina. Results serve as an important baseline for evaluating how potential future changes in hurricane frequency and intensity will impact forest tree mortality and carbon balance.
Zeng, L., Chassignet, E. P., Schmitt, R. W., Xu, X., & Wang, D. (2018). Salinification in the South China Sea Since Late 2012: A Reversal of the Freshening Since the 1990s. Geophys. Res. Lett. , 45 (6), 2744–2751.
Zhang, M., Wu, Z., & Qiao, F. (2018). Deep Atlantic Ocean Warming Facilitated by the Deep Western Boundary Current and Equatorial Kelvin Waves. J. Climate , 31 (20), 8541–8555.
Abstract: Increased heat storage in deep oceans has been proposed to account for the slowdown of global surface warming since the end of the twentieth century. How the imbalanced heat at the surface has been redistributed to deep oceans remains to be elucidated. Here, the evolution of deep Atlantic Ocean heat storage since 1950 on multidecadal or longer time scales is revealed. The anomalous heat in the deep Labrador Sea was transported southward by the shallower core of the deep western boundary current (DWBC). Upon reaching the equator around 1980, this heat transport route bifurcated into two, with one continuing southward along the DWBC and the other extending eastward along a narrow strip (about 4 degrees width) centered at the equator. In the 1990s and 2000s, meridional diffusion helped to spread warming in the tropics, making the eastward equatorial warming extension have a narrow head and wider tail. The deep Atlantic Ocean warming since 1950 had overlapping variability of approximately 60 years. The results suggest that the current basinwide Atlantic Ocean warming at depths of 1000-2000 m can be traced back to the subsurface warming in the Labrador Sea in the 1950s. An inference from these results is that the increased heat storage in the twenty-first century in the deep Atlantic Ocean is unlikely to partly account for the atmospheric radiative imbalance during the last two decades and to serve as an explanation for the current warming hiatus.
Zhang, M., Zhang, Y., Shu, Q., Zhao, C., Wang, G., Wu, Z., et al. (2018). Spatiotemporal evolution of the chlorophyll a trend in the North Atlantic Ocean. Sci Total Environ , 612 , 1141–1148.
Abstract: Analyses of the chlorophyll a concentration (chla) from satellite ocean color products have suggested the decadal-scale variability of chla linked to the climate change. The decadal-scale variability in chla is both spatially and temporally non-uniform. We need to understand the spatiotemporal evolution of chla in decadal or multi-decadal timescales to better evaluate its linkage to climate variability. Here, the spatiotemporal evolution of the chla trend in the North Atlantic Ocean for the period 1997-2016 is analyzed using the multidimensional ensemble empirical mode decomposition method. We find that this variable trend signal of chla shows a dipole pattern between the subpolar gyre and along the Gulf Stream path, and propagation along the opposite direction of the North Atlantic Current. This propagation signal has an overlapping variability of approximately twenty years. Our findings suggest that the spatiotemporal evolution of chla during the two most recent decades is part of the multidecadal variations and possibly regulated by the changes of Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, whereas the mechanisms of such evolution patterns still need to be explored.
Zhao, X., Zhou, C., Xu, X., Ye, R., Tian, J., & Zhao, W. (2019). Deep Circulation in the South China Sea Simulated in a Regional Model. Ocean Sci. Discuss , .
Abstract: The South China Sea (SCS) is the largest marginal sea in the northwest Pacific Ocean. In this study, deep circulation in the SCS is investigated using results from 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 circulation are a basin-scale cyclonic gyre and a concentrated deep western boundary current (DWBC). Transport of the DWBC is ∼ 2 Sv at 16.5° N with a width of ∼53 km. Flowing southwestward, the narrow DWBC becomes weaker with a wider range. The model results reveal the existence of 80- to 120-day oscillation in the deep northeastern circulation and the DWBC, which are also the areas with elevated eddy kinetic energy. This intraseasonal oscillation propagates northwestward with a velocity amplitude of ∼ 1.0 to 1.5 cm s-1. The distribution of mixing parameters in the deep SCS plays a role in both spatial structure and volume transport of the deep circulation. Compared with the northern shelf of the SCS with the Luzon Strait, deep circulation in the SCS is more sensitive to the large vertical mixing parameters of the Zhongsha Island Chain area.
Zheng, Y., Bourassa, M. A., & Dukhovskoy, D. S. (2018). Upper-Ocean Processes Controlling the Sea Surface Temperature in the Western Gulf of Mexico. In American Geophysical Union (Vol. Fall Meeting).
Abstract: This study examines the upper-ocean processes controlling the mixed layer temperature in the western Gulf of Mexico (GOM) through estimating the contributing terms in the heat equation, with an emphasis on eddies' role. The major heat contributing terms for the upper GOM were estimated using two ocean reanalysis datasets: an eddy-resolving HYbrid Coordinate Ocean Model (HYCOM) and a Simple Ocean Data Assimilation (SODA). Analysis of net surface heat fluxes from four datasets reveals that the long-term mean net surface heat flux cools the northern GOM and warms the southern GOM. Two regions are focused for analysis: an eddy-rich region where LCEs are energetic, and the southwestern Gulf where eddy activity is relatively weak and the features of near surface temperature differ from the eddy-rich region. An eddy-rich region in the western GOM is defined based on the eddy kinetic energy derived from satellite sea surface heights. The long-term mean horizontal heat advection causes a weak warming over most of the eddy rich region, partly attributed to the flow-temperature configuration that the long-term and seasonally mean flow is nearly parallel to the corresponding mean isotherms. By contrast, the temporal mean vertical heat advection causes a strong warming in the eddy rich region, partly balancing the cooling caused by net surface heat flux. The temporal mean eddy heat flux convergence in the western GOM, whose positive and negative values are not small at some locations, appears heterogeneous in space, resulting in a small term for the western GOM when area averaged. The persistent warm water in the southwestern Gulf is primarily caused by the net warming from net surface heat flux rather than from eddies and heat advection.
Zheng, Y., Lin, J. - L., & Shinoda, T. (2012). The equatorial Pacific cold tongue simulated by IPCC AR4 coupled GCMs: Upper ocean heat budget and feedback analysis. J. Geophys. Res. , 117 (C5).