The Southern ocean seen through an intercomparison between new ocean reanalysis products

• Grant number: 12/03724-7
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: June 01, 2012
• End date: May 31, 2013
• Field of knowledge: Physical Sciences and Mathematics - Oceanography - Physical Oceanography
• Principal Investigator: Ilana Elazari Klein Coaracy Wainer
• Grantee: Martim Mas e Braga
• Host Institution: Instituto Oceanográfico (IO). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The Southern Ocean plays an important role in global climate maintenance due to the Antarctic Circumpolar Current System, which has its unique characteristics that regulate the transference of properties between our planet's ocean basins. Since observational data is hard to be obtained in this region, the ocean reanalysis techniques allow synthetic data fields that correspond to what would be the local observations to be obtained. However, different research centers develop different reanalysis techniques, thus generating differences between their respective datasets. Therefore, the aim of this research is to analyze four different ocean reanalysis datasets through a series of statistical techniques in order to discover which one suits best the Southern Ocean.(AU)