2. Kuroshio Extension
An international experiment is being planned in the Kuroshio Extension and adjacent regions between Japan and the Shatsky Rise for the year 2001-2005 time frame. Major objectives are:
1) To estimate the air-sea fluxes in the ocean-atmosphere mixed-layer process in the Kuroshio Extension region
2) To determine heat and freshwater budgets in the Kuroshio Extension region, focusing on cross-frontal exchange of subarctic and subtropical waters.
The intensive observation program includes both in situ and remote sensing measurements: surface meteorological (TRITON) buoys, ocean acoustic tomography moorings, inverted echosounders with bottom pressure sensors (Fig. 1), and Lagrangean surface/subsurface floats will be major observing components. Other components will include ADCP and CTD/XCTD/XBT profiles, conventional subsurface moorings, as well as satellite altimetry, sea surface temperature, and winds.
Goals of this observational process study, in summary, are to tune and verify ocean models with improved understanding of important physical processes associated with the inter-gyre exchange of heat and potential vorticity, and to elucidate their roles in interannual to interdecadal Pacific climate change.
References
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Hanawa, K., 1987: Interannual variation in the winter-time outcrop area of Subtropical Mode Water in the western North Pacific Ocean, ATMOSPHERE-OCEAN, 25, 358-374.
Hanawa, K. and Y. Yoshikawa, 1993: TOLEX-XBT/ADCP monitoring, Ext. Abst. Int. WCRP Symp. - Clouds and Ocean in Climate -, 3.25 - 3.27.
Hanawa, K., Y. Yoshikawa and T. Taneda, 1996: TOLEX-ADCP monitoring, Geophys. Res. Letters, 23, 2429-2432.
Kawabe, M., 1985: Sea Level variations at the Izu Islands and typical stable paths of the Kuroshio, J. Oceanogr. Soc. Japan, 41, 307-326.
Yoshikawa, Y., K. Ando, H. Mitsudera, K. Muneyama, K. Hanawa, 1996: Tokyo-Ogasawara Line Experiment XBT monitoring, 1988-1995, JAMSTEC Data Report, 102pp.
Yoshikawa, Y., M. Kim, H. Mitsudera, 1999: Mesoscale eddies and the Kuroshio Recirculation south of Japan., Proceedings of Japan-China joint symposium on cooperative study of subtropical circulation study, 177-184.
