Wilbert Weijer, Bernadette Sloyan, Mathew Maltrud, Nicole Jeffery, Matthew Hecht, Corinne Hartin, Erik van Sebille, Ilana Wainer and Laura Landrum
In Journal of Climate, 2012, volume 25, pages 2652-2675,
doi:10.1175/JCLI-D-11-00302.1.
The new Community Climate System Model, version 4 (CCSM4) provides a powerful tool to understand and predict the Earth’s climate system. We explore several aspects of the Southern Ocean in the CCSM4 including the surface climatology and interannual variability, simulation of key climate water masses (Antarctic Bottom Water, Subantarctic Mode Water and Antarctic Intermediate Water), the transport and structure of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, and interbasin exchange via the Agulhas and Tasman leakages and at the Brazil–Malvinas confluence. We find that the CCSM4 has varying degrees of accuracy in the simulation of the climate of the Southern Ocean when compared to observations. This study has identified aspects of the model that warrant further analysis that will result in a more comprehensive understanding of ocean-atmosphere-ice dynamics and interactions that control the Earth's climate and its variability.
© Copyright 2012 American Meteorological Society (AMS). Permission to use figures, tables, and brief excerpts from this work in scientific and educational works is hereby granted provided that the source is acknowledged. Any use of material in this work that is determined to be fair use under Section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Act or that satisfies the conditions specified in Section 108 of the U.S. Copyright Act (17 USC §108, as revised by P.L. 94-553) does not require the AMSs permission. Republication, systematic reproduction, posting in electronic form on servers, or other uses of this material, except as exempted by the above statement, requires written permission or a license from the AMS. Additional details are provided in the AMS Copyright Policy, available on the AMS Web site located at (
http://www.ametsoc.org/AMS) or from the AMS at 617-227-2425 or
[email protected].
Permission to place a copy of this work on this server has been provided by the AMS. The AMS does not guarantee that the copy provided here is an accurate copy of the published work.